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On the operating temperature of superconducting magnets cooled by superfluid helium.

Number: pap. n. 27

Author(s) : LEBRUN P., TAVIAN L., WEELDEREN R. van

Summary

Cooling by superfluid helium has become a standard technology for achieving high fields in superconducting magnets using low-temperature superconductors such as Nb-Ti: operating at 1.8 K shifts the critical curve of the superconducting alloy upwards by about 3 T with respect to the normal boiling temperature of helium at 4.2 K, thus allowing to build magnets in the 10 T range with reasonable engineering current density. Pioneered in the 1980s, and first demonstrated on a large scale on the Tore Supra tokamak, superfluid helium cooling is now widely used for NMR magnets and constitutes the key technology for the magnets of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. The thermodynamic cost of operating close to the absolute zero requires optimal management of the temperatures, particularly when the applied heat loads become large, e.g. for the focusing magnets of the high-luminosity upgrade of the LHC, subject to high dynamic heat loads deposited by the stray particles from the collision points. We identify, analyse and discuss quantitatively the different factors contributing to the operating temperature of superconducting magnets cooled by superfluid helium, and illustrate the analysis with the cases of the present LHC and of its luminosity upgrade project.

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Pages: 35-40

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Details

  • Original title: On the operating temperature of superconducting magnets cooled by superfluid helium.
  • Record ID : 30011060
  • Languages: English
  • Source: Cryogenics 2014. Proceedings of the 13th IIR International Conference: Prague, Czech Republic, April 7-11, 2014.
  • Publication date: 2014/04/07

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