Mid-Scale RI-1 (M1:DP): Preliminary & Final Design of the 40T All Superconducting Magnet

High magnetic fields are a valuable scientific tool for studying the properties of newly discovered materials. Unique properties of new materials enable new technologies to address current and future societal challenges. Currently, the very highest continuous magnetic fields (up to 45 teslas, or one million times the Earth’s magnetic field) are only available in high-powered magnets that cost thousands of dollars of electricity for every hour of operation.

High-magnetic-field research on new materials is so important that the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (NHMFL) hosts thousands of scientists annually, but is unable to meet the demand. By contrast, magnets that are entirely superconducting do not dissipate heat and therefore do not need large amounts of electrical power to operate. As such, superconducting magnets can provide high magnetic fields virtually non-stop with a very low operating cost and low environmental impact.

However, commercial superconducting magnets are presently limited to 28 teslas. The NHMFL built a world-record 32 tesla superconducting magnet in 2017. This design project builds on that success by enabling the NHMFL to create a Final Design for a 40 tesla superconducting magnet.

Such a magnet will revolutionize high-magnetic-field research, allowing researchers from throughout the scientific community to study their new materials for as long as their experiments require. Like the NHMFL’s world-record 32 tesla superconducting magnet, this 40 tesla superconducting magnet will be able to operate at the same time as the NHMFL’s high-powered magnets, greatly increasing the amount of time available for experiments at high magnetic fields.

This project is completing a Final Design of a superconducting magnet capable of delivering 40 teslas in a 34 millimeter bore at 4.2 K. The Final Design enables the magnet to ramp from zero to 40 teslas in one hour or less to allow for high-magnetic-field experiments requiring swept magnetic fields. The magnet will advance research frontiers in quantum matter, including high temperature superconductivity, Ising superconductivity, re-entrant superconductivity, exciton condensation, non-Abelian quasiparticles, and topological matter in its myriad forms.

This Design Project includes significant computational and experimental work to design, build, and test coils constructed from Rare Earth Barium Copper Oxide (REBCO) tape in double-pancake form. Test coils subjected to repeated cycling to high stress and repeated quenching from high current illuminate the reliability of the design principles incorporated in the Final Design of the 40 tesla superconducting magnet.

Lessons learned from the test coils allow the Final Design to be completed with high confidence in the performance of an eventual 40 tesla superconducting magnet, construction of which would be funded in a subsequent proposal.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.