Accelerated coated conductor program at Los Alamos national laboratory

Abstract

In order to accelerate research and development of coated conductors (CC), a new facility has been developed at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) with labs dedicated to scaled-up fabrication and characterization of CC. These laboratories include facilities for metal tape preparation, ion-beam assisted deposition (IBAD) of template layers, superconductor deposition by laser ablation (PLD), as well as materials characterization including low-temperature transport measurements. The work builds on the prior successes of the LANL CC program, such as the benchmark results of critical currents over 300 A on 1-cm-wide short samples deposited via IBAD and PLD. The new labs have recently been completed and include the ability for reel-to-reel tape processing and characterization. Fabrication of long lengths of tape (>10 m) allow for high-throughput experimentation by linear combinatorial design. This facility is also made to enable collaboration with industrial and other partners.