Earticle

The pulsed field magnetization of the short-circuited soldered double pancake coil made of stabilized commercial high-Tc superconductor (HTS) tape is experimentally studied. The evolution of the shielding current induced by the pulsed field and the trapped field after the pulsed magnetization was measured at 77 K. It is shown that the trapped field in the coil is close to the value reached in the field cooling process and reduces weakly at 5-fold increasing of pulsed field amplitude. The current relaxation at t~2 ms after the pulse is defined by the current sharing between the tape's copper coating and the YBa2Cu3O7-d layer. In the intermediate time scale (1 s < t < 100 s) the flux creep in HTS layer dominates. At t > 100 s the current’s relaxation is defined by the resistance of soldered joint between tapes.

Developing a gate-tunable, scalable, and topologically-protectable supercurrent qubit and integrating it into a quantum circuit are crucial for applications in the fields of quantum information technology and topological phenomena. Here we propose that the nano-hybrid supercurrent transistors, a superconducting quantum analogue of a transistor, made of topological insulator nanowire would be a promising platform for unprecedented control of both the supercurrent magnitude and the current-phase relation by applying a voltage on a gate electrode. We believe that our experimental design will help probing Majorana state in topological insulator nanowire and establishing a solid-state platform for topological supercurrent qubit.

Radio-frequency (RF) amplifiers based on direct current (DC) superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID) have low-noise performance for precision physics experiments. Gain curves of SQUID RF amplifiers depend on several parameters of the SQUID and operation conditions. We are developing SQUID RF amplifiers for application to measure very weak RF signals from ultra-low-temperature high-magnetic-field microwave cavity in axion search experiments. In this study, we designed, fabricated and characterized SQUID RF amplifiers with different SQUID parameters, such as number of input coil turn, shunt resistance value of the junction and coupling capacitance in the input coil, and compared the results.

We present terahertz optical properties of GdBa2Cu3O7-x (GdBCO) superconducting thin films. GdBCO films with a thickness of about 105 nm were grown on a LaAlO3 (LAO) single crystal substrate using a conventional pulsed laser deposition (PLD) technique. Using an Ar ion milling system, the thickness of the GdBCO film was reduced to 58 nm, and its surface was also smoothened. Terahertz (THz) transmission spectra through two different GdBCO films are measured over the range between 0.2 and 1.5 THz using THz time domain spectroscopy. Interestingly, the THz transmission of the thinner GdBCO film has been increased to six times larger than that of the thicker one, while the thinner film is still maintaining its superconducting property at below 90 K.

This study was carried out to investigate the effect of milling of boron (B), which is one of raw materials of MgB2, on the critical current density (Jc) of MgB2. B powder used in this study is semi-amorphous B (Pavezyum, Turkey, 97% purity, 1 micron). The size of B powder was reduced by planetary milling using ZrO2 balls (a diameter of 2 mm). The B powder and balls with a ratio of 1:20 were charged in a ceramic jar and then the jar was filled with toluene. The milling time was varied from 0 to 8 h. The milled B powders were mixed with Mg powder in the composition of (Mg+2B), and the powder mixtures were uniaxially pressed at 3 tons. The powder compacts were heat-treated at 700℃ for 1 h in flowing argon gas. Powder X-ray diffraction and FWHM (Full width at half maximum) were used to analyze the phase formation and crystallinity of MgB2. The superconducting transition temperature (Tc) and Jc of MgB2 were measured using a magnetic property measurement system (MPMS). It was found that B2O3 was formed by B milling and the subsequent drying process, and the volume fraction of B2O3 increased as milling time increased. The Tc of MgB2 decreased with increasing milling time, which was explained in terms of the decreased volume fraction of MgB2, the line broadening of MgB2 peaks and the formation of B2O3. The Jc at 5 K increased with increasing milling time. The Jc increase is more remarkable at the magnetic field higher than 3 T. The Jc at 5 K and 4 T was the highest as 4.37×104 A/cm2 when milling time was 2 h. The Jc at 20 K also increased with increasing milling time. However, The Jc of the samples with the prolonged milling for 6 and 8 h were lower than that of the non-milled sample.

This paper presents a conceptual design approach of air-cored synchronous machine with high temperature superconductor (HTS) field winding. With a given configuration of a target machine, boundary conditions are set in the cylindrical coordinate system and analytic field calculation is performed by solving a governing equation. To set proper boundary conditions, current distributions of the field winding and the armature winding are expressed by the Fourier expansion. Based on analytic magnetic field calculation results, key machine parameters are calculated: 1) inductance, 2) critical current of field winding, 3) weight, 4) HTS conductor consumption, and 5) efficiency. To investigate all potential design options, 6 sweeping parameters are determined to characterize the geometry of the machine and the parameter calculation process is performed for each design options. Among design options satisfying constraints including >80 % critical current margin and >95 % efficiency, in this paper, a first-cut design was selected in terms of overall machine weight and HTS conductor consumption to obtain a lightweight and economical design. The goal is to design a 5-MW machine by referring to the same capacity machine that was previously constructed by another group. Our design output is compared with finite element method (FEM) simulation to validate our design approach.

The lumped-parameter circuit model for a no- insulation (NI) high temperature superconductor (HTS) magnet has been well understood after many experimental and analytic studies over a decade. It successfully explains the non-linear charging behaviors of NI magnets. Yet, recently, multiple groups reported that the post-quench electromechanical behaviors of an NI HTS magnet may not be well explained by the lumped circuit model. The characteristic resistance of an NI magnet is one of the key parameters to characterize the so-called “NI behaviors” of an NI magnet and recently a few groups reported a potential that the characteristic resistance of an NI magnet may substantially vary during a quench. This paper deals with this issue, the increment of contact resistance of the no-insulation (NI) REBCO magnet during a quench and its impact on the post-quench behaviors. A 7 T 78 mm NI REBCO magnet that was previously built by the MIT Francis Bitter Magnet Laboratory was chosen for our simulation to investigate the increment of contact resistance to better duplicate the post-quench coil voltages in the simulation. The simulation results showed that using the contact resistance value measured in the liquid nitrogen test, the magnitude of the current through the coil must be much greater than the critical current. This indicates that the value of the contact resistance should increase sharply after the quench occurs, depending on the lumped circuit model.

This paper presents an analytic method to calculate energy conversion between electromagnetically coupled high-temperature superconducting and copper coils. The energy transfer from one coil to the other is commonly observed during quench of a noinsulation (NI) high temperature superconductor (HTS) magnet. Proper understanding of this phenomenon is particularly important to protect an NI HTS magnet, especially to avoid any potential mechanical damages. In this paper, analytic equations are obtained to estimate the energy transfer between the NI and copper coils. The well-known lumped-parameter circuit model is adopted provided that key parameters of the coils are given.

This study investigates mixtures of water and cryoprotectant agents (CPAs) to store high-grade cold energy. Although water is an ideal material for a cold thermal storage (CTS) due to its high specific heat, undesirable volume expansion may cause structural stresses during freezing. The volume expansion can be alleviated by adding the CPAs to water. However, the CPA aqueous solutions not only have different thermal properties but also transit to amorphous state different from pure water. Therefore, these characteristics should be considered when using them as material of the CTS. In experiments, glycerol and dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) are selected as the candidate CPA. The volume expansion of the solution is measured by an in-situ strain gauge in low temperature region. The specific heat capacity of the solution is also measured by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). Both the amount of volume expansion and the specific heat capacity of the CPA aqueous solution decrease in the case of higher concentration of CPA. These characteristics should be contemplated to select optimal aqueous solution for CTS for liquid air energy storage system (LAES). The CPA solutions have advantages of having wide temperature range to utilize the latent heat of water and higher sensible heat of the CPA. The CPA solutions which can satisfy the allowable stress of the structure are determined. Consequently, among the CPA solutions investigated, DMSO 20% w/w solution is the most suitable for the CTS.