Design, fabrication, and characterization of a high-field high-temperature superconducting Bi-2212 accelerator dipole magnet

Abstract

The use of high-field superconducting magnets has furthered the development of medical diagnosis, fusion research, accelerators, and particle physics. High-temperature superconductors enable magnets more powerful than those possible with Nb-Ti (superconducting transition temperature ${T}_{c}$ of 9.2 K) and ${\mathrm{Nb}}_{3}\mathrm{Sn}$ (${T}_{c}$ of 18.4 K) conductors due to their very high critical field ${B}_{c2}$ of greater than 100 T near 4.2 K. However, the development of high-field accelerator magnets using high-temperature superconductors is still at its early stage. We report the construction of the world's first high-temperature superconducting ${\mathrm{Bi}}_{2}{\mathrm{Sr}}_{2}{\mathrm{CaCu}}_{2}{\mathrm{O}}_{x}$ (Bi-2212 with ${T}_{c}$ of $\ensuremath{\sim}82\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{K}$) accelerator dipole magnet. The magnet is based on a canted-cosine-theta design with Bi-2212 Rutherford cables. A high critical current was achieved by an overpressure processing heat treatment. The magnet was constructed from a nine-strand Rutherford cable made from industrial 0.8 mm wires. At 4.2 K, it reached a quench current of 3600 A and a dipole field of 1.64 T in a bore of 31 mm. The magnet did not exhibit the undesirable quench training common in Nb-Ti and ${\mathrm{Nb}}_{3}\mathrm{Sn}$ accelerator magnets. It quenched a dozen times without degradation. The magnet exhibited low magnetic field hysteresis ($<0.1%$) as measured by a cryogenic Hall sensor. It was fast cycled to 1.47 T at $0.54\text{ }\text{ }\mathrm{T}/\mathrm{s}$ without quenches. This work validates the canted-cosine-theta Bi-2212 dipole magnet design, illustrates the fabrication scheme, and establishes an initial performance benchmark.