Cold Facts Digital – Page 63 – The go-to place for Cryogenics and Superconductivity

Goddard Goings: Insight Into Its Past, Present and Future

James Webb Space Telescope-“I’m Back in the Saddle Again!” – It’s likely anyone reading this article has heard about the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). The telescope launched on December 25, 2021 (EST) with much fanfare. Over the next month, it traveled to its observation location at the L2 Lagrange...

NASA Completes Heart of Roman Space Telescope’s Primary Instrument

The heart of NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope was recently delivered to Ball Aerospace in Boulder, Colo., for integration into the Wide Field Instrument (WFI). Called the Focal Plane System (FPS), it serves as the core of Roman’s camera. When the mission launches by May 2027, astronomers will use...

SpaceLogistics Sells Third Mission Extension Pod

Northrop Grumman Corporation’s SpaceLogistics has sold its third Mission Extension Pod (MEP), a propulsion “jet pack” that extends the life of legacy satellites, allowing them to operate longer and more profitably. Under a purchase agreement with Intelsat, SpaceLogistics’ Mission Robotic Vehicle (MRV), a servicing spacecraft equipped with robotic arms, will install the jet...

Principles of Operation for a ZPC Dilution Refrigerator

Understanding the basic principles of dilution refrigeration is essential for operating a ZPC dilution refrigerator effectively. While there are comprehensive guides available on the subject, we provide a condensed overview for quick reference. The first principle involves the cooling of helium isotopes. Helium-4 (4He), the common isotope, liquefies at 4.2 K...

Preparing for the Next Era of Neutrino Research

At CERN’s Neutrino Platform on the Laboratory’s Prévessin site in France sit two large boxes encased in a red grating. Inside these boxes are vast chambers surrounded by shiny stainless steel. The boxes are the cryostat modules of the ProtoDUNE experiment. Despite their large size, they are tiny in comparison...

Swift Aircraft Selects GKN Aerospace to Help Reach RAF’s Net-Zero Targets

Swift Aircraft, the visionary company behind the innovative British aerobatic light aircraft called the Swift, has joined forces with a team of British innovators to drive sustainable flight forward. Their collaboration is supported by the Project MONET contract, awarded by the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD), aimed at demonstrating technologies...

Latest in Defining Cryogenics

Two-Phase Flows

Two-phase flows are those flows in which there is a mixture of two physical states (solid, liquid or vapor). In cryogenic applications, such flows are almost always a mixture of a cryogenic liquid along with its corresponding vapor. A mixture of liquid helium and helium vapor would be a typical...

Supercritical Fluids

A supercritical fluid is defined as a substance whose temperature and pressure exceed those of its critical point. Every pure substance has a critical point that is defined in thermodynamic space by a critical temperature and a corresponding critical pressure. For example, the critical point for helium has a critical...

Brayton Cycle

The Brayton cycle is one of the many thermodynamic cycles used to generate cooling at cryogenic temperatures. Strictly speaking, when referring to cooling we should call this the reverse Brayton cycle as the original Brayton cycle describes the process of power generation or propulsion via a gas turbine. In many...

Latest in Cryo Central

Cryogenic Electronics

Randall Kirschman, consulting physicist, Mountain View, California ExtElect@gmail.com Cryogenic electronics—the operation of electronic devices, circuits, and systems at cryogenic temperatures—has been a valuable technology for decades. Cryogenic electronics (also referred to as low-temperature electronics, or cold electronics) can be based on semiconductive devices, on superconductive devices, or on a combination...

Particle Physics: High Energy Physics

Cryogenics and High-Energy Physics 1. From symmetry magazine: http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/cms/?pid=1000627: Cryogenics is the study of how materials behave at temperatures near absolute zero. In high-energy particle accelerators, such frigid temperatures reduce the electrical resistance of wires in superconducting magnets, increasing the magnet strength and allowing faster particle acceleration. The same holds...

HTS Degaussing Systems

From the Spring 2009 issue of Cold Facts (Volume 25, Number 2): Thanks to a joint project by the US Navy and a number of industry partners, high temperature superconducting (HTS) technology is now at the heart of an advanced degaussing system aboard the USS Higgins at the naval station...

Magnetic Resonance Imaging

From http://www.superconductors.org: An area where superconductors can perform a life-saving function is in the field of biomagnetism. Doctors need a non-invasive means of determining what’s going on inside the human body. By impinging a strong superconductor-derived magnetic field into the body, hydrogen atoms that exist in the body’s water and...

Latest in Ask the Experts

An Issue of Pressure and Flow Rate in a Supply Tank

Please help solve this problem: A supply tank requires a vaporizer to generate sufficient pressure to pump stored fluid up into a vehicle or tank. The available head is limited as the tank level falls and it is important to minimize the system pressure drop to maintain the desired flow...

Using MLI on VJ Line Joints or Cryo Storage Tanks

When installing Multi Layer Insulation (MLI) blankets on VJ line joints or cryo storage tanks should they be wrapped and tied down tight or loose? These are usually pre-cut to size. Also should they have an access hole at the point of where the molecular sieve is installed to help...

Separated layers of ice over a pipe

I want to know that why there are different layers of ice over a pipe carrying a cryogenic fluid, each layer separated with clear marks / lines? What do these layers signify?

Using nitrogen as a cryogen

Is it possible to achieve -200˚C using nitrogen as a cryogen?

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