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MALAVIYA NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF

TECHNOLOGY

SUPERCONDUCTOR

By Under the guidance of


Sunil Kumar Meena Mrs.Nikita
2008UEE153 Jhajharia

Department of Electrical Engineering


MNIT Jaipur
ACKNOWLEDGMENT

Any mission can never conclude without cooperation from sur-


roundings. It is a great pleasure for me to make use of this
opportunity to express my thanks to those persons who helped
me to bring out my presentation as a successful venture.

First of all I express my deep sense of gratitude & sincere


thanks to my mentor Nikita Jhajharia for encouraging me to
deliver my seminar in the topic of my interest & also giving me
the constant and valuable guidance, in absence of which my pre-
sentation would have been incomplete.

Last but not the least, I thank all of my colleagues and friends
for assisting me and helping me.

Sunil Kumar Meena


2008UEE153
Third Year
Electrical Engineering
Contents

1 INTRODUCTION 3

2 Applications of Superconductivity 8
2.1 Superconducting Magnets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
2.2 Power Transmission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
2.3 Transportation (Maglev Trains) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.4 Electric Motors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.5 Electronics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.6 Military Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

3 conclusion 17

4 Reference 18

1
List of Figures

1.1 Physicist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.2 Superconducting material repel magnet . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.3 graphic courtesy Quantum Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1.4 A Magnet Levitating Above a High-Temperature Supercon-
ductor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.5 The Evolution of the Superconducting Transition Temperature 7

2.1 Superconducting Magnet Wire of Niobium-Titanium . . . . . 9


2.2 The Superconducting Super-Collider project planned for con-
struction in Ellis county, Texas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
2.3 Superconducting Magnet Coils . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
2.4 Magnetic levitation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.5 Japan has a demonstration line in Yamanashi prefecture where
test trains JR-Maglev MLX01 have reached 581 km/h (361
mph), slightly faster than any wheeled trains . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.6 Principle of maglev and use of superconductors . . . . . . . . 12
2.7 Cross Sections Of Two Typical Filamantary Composites Of
NbTi In A Copper Matrix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.8 Magnetometer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.9 Hypres Superconducting Microchip, Incorporating 6000 Joseph-
son Junctions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.10 American Superconductor unveiled a 5000-horsepower motor
made with superconducting wire. Even larger 36.5MW HTS
ship propulsion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

2
Chapter 1

INTRODUCTION

Superconductors materials that have no resistance to the flow of electric-


ity,are one of the last great frontiers of scientific discovery.Not only have the
limits of superconductivity not yet been reached, but the theories that ex-
plain superconductor behavior seem to be constantly under review. In 1911
superconductivity was first observed in mercury by Dutch physicist Heike
Kamerlingh Onnes of Leiden University (shows in fig 1.1 ). When he cooled
it to the temperature of liquid helium, 4 degrees Kelvin (-452F, -269C) , its
resistance suddenly disappeared . The Kelvin scale represents an ”absolute”
scale of temperature. Thus, it was necessary for Onnes to come within 4
degrees of the coldest temperature that is theoretically attainable to witness
the phenomenon of superconductivity. Later, in 1913 he won a Nobel Prize
in physics for his research in this area.

The next great milestone in understanding how matter behaves at ex-


treme cold temperatures occurred in 1933. German researchers Walther
Meissner (above) and Robert Ochsenfeld (above) discovered that a supercon-
ducting material will repel a magnetic field (below fig.1). A magnet moving
by a conductor induces currents in the conductor. This is the principle on
which the electric generator operates. But, in a superconductor the induced
currents exactly mirror the field that would have otherwise penetrated the

Figure 1.1: Physicist

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Figure 1.2: Superconducting material repel magnet

superconducting material - causing the magnet to be repulsed. This phe-


nomenon is known as strong diamagnetism and is today often referred to as
the ”Meissner effect” (an eponym). The Meissner effect is so strong that a
magnet can actually be levitated over a superconductive material.

In subsequent decades other superconducting metals, alloys and com-


pounds were discovered. In 1941 niobium-nitride was found to super con-
duct at 16 K. In 1953 vanadium-silicon displayed superconductive prop-
erties at 17.5 K. And, in 1962 scientists at Westinghouse developed the
first commercial superconducting wire, an alloy of niobium and titanium
(NbTi). High-energy, particle-accelerator electromagnets made of copper-
clad niobium-titanium were then developed in the 1960s at the Rutherford-
Appleton Laboratory in the UK, and were first employed in a superconduct-
ing accelerator at the Fermilab Tevatronin in the US in 1997 .

The first widely-accepted theoretical understanding of superconductivity


was advanced in 1957 by American physicists John Bardeen, Leon Cooper,
and John Schrieffer . Their Theories of Superconductivity became know as
the BCS theory - derived from the first letter of each man’s last name -
and won them a Nobel prize in 1972. The mathematically complex BCS
theory explained superconductivity at temperatures close to absolute zero
for elements and simple alloys. However, at higher temperatures and with
different superconductor systems, the BCS theory has subsequently become
inadequate to fully explain how superconductivity is occurring.

Another significant theoretical advancement came in 1962 when Brian D.


Josephson , a graduate student at Cambridge University, predicted that elec-
trical current would flow between two superconducting materials - even when
they are separated by a non-superconductor or insulator. His prediction was
later confirmed and won him a share of the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physics.
This tunneling phenomenon is today known as the ”Josephson effect” and

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Figure 1.3: graphic courtesy Quantum Design

has been applied to electronic devices such as the SQUID, an instrument ca-
pabable of detecting even the weakest magnetic fields(show in fig 1.3 graphic).

The term Superconductivity is a phenomenon occurring in cer-


tain materials at extremely low temperatures, characterized by ex-
actly zero electrical resistance and the exclusion of the interior
magnetic field (the Meissner effect). The electrical resistivity of a metal-
lic conductor decreases gradually as the temperature is lowered. However, in
ordinary conductors such as copper and silver, impurities and other defects
impose a lower limit. Even near absolute zero a real sample of copper shows
a non-zero resistance. The resistance of a superconductor, on the other hand,
drops abruptly to zero when the material is cooled below its ”critical temper-
ature”. An electrical current flowing in a loop of superconducting wire can
persist indefinitely with no power source. Like ferromagnetism and atomic
spectral lines, superconductivity is a quantum mechanical phenomenon. It
cannot be understood simply as the idealization of ”perfect conductivity” in
classical physics.

Superconductivity occurs in a wide variety of materials, including simple


elements like tin and aluminium, various metallic alloys and some heavily-
doped semiconductors. Superconductivity does not occur in noble metals like
gold and silver, nor in most ferromagnetic metals. In 1986 the discovery of
a family of cuprate-perovskite ceramic materials known as high-temperature
superconductors, with critical temperatures in excess of 90 Kelvin, spurred
renewed interest and research in superconductivity for several reasons. As a
topic of pure research, these materials represented a new phenomenon not
explained by the current theory. And, because the superconducting state per-
sists up to more manageable temperatures (past the economically-important
boiling point of liquid nitrogen), more commercial applications are feasible,
especially if materials with even higher critical temperatures could be dis-
covered.

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Figure 1.4: A Magnet Levitating Above a High-Temperature Superconductor

BCS Theory: The first widely-accepted theory to explain superconduc-


tivity put forth in 1957 by John Bardeen, Leon Cooper, and John Schreiffer.
The theory asserts that, as electrons pass through a crystal lattice, the lat-
tice deforms inward towards the electrons generating sound packets known
as ”phonons”. These phonons produce a trough of positive charge in the area
of deformation that assists subsequent electrons in passing through the same
region in a process known as phonon-mediated coupling. This is analogous
to rolling a bowling ball up the middle of a bed. 2 people, one lying on each
side of the bed, will tend to roll toward the center of the bed, once the ball
has created a depression in the mattress. And, a 2nd bowling ball, placed at
the foot of the bed, will now, quite easily, roll toward the middle.

Josephson Effect: A phenomenon named for Cambridge graduate stu-


dent Brian Josephson, who predicted that electrons would ”tunnel” through
a narrow (¡10 angstroms) non-superconducting region, even in the absence
of an external voltage. In a normal conductor, electrical current only flows
when there’s a voltage differential and contiguous electrical connection. It
has been theorized that the Josephson Effect arises from the incoherent phase
relationships between superconducting electrons in the two (separated) su-
perconductors. The AC Josephson Effect is where the current flow oscillates
as an external magnetic field impinged upon it increases beyond a critical
value. [at a frequency of 2eV/h, where e is the electron charge, V is the
voltage that appears, and h is Planck’s constant].

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Figure 1.5: The Evolution of the Superconducting Transition Temperature

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Chapter 2

Applications of
Superconductivity

1. Superconducting Magnets

2. Power Transmission

3. Transportation (MAGLEV Trains)

4. Electric Motors

5. SQUID Magnetometers

6. Electronics

7. Military applications

2.1 Superconducting Magnets


Type II superconductors such as niobium-tin and niobium-titanium are used
to make the coil windings for superconducting magnets. These two materials
can be fabricated into wires and can withstand high magnetic fields. Typical
construction of the coils is to embed a large number of fine filaments ( 20 mi-
crometers diameter) in a copper matrix. The solid copper gives mechanical
stability and provides a path for the large currents in case the supercon-
ducting state is lost. These superconducting magnets must be cooled with
liquid helium. Superconducting magnets can use solenoid geometries as do
ordinary electromagnets.

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Figure 2.1: Superconducting Magnet Wire of Niobium-Titanium

Figure 2.2: The Superconducting Super-Collider project planned for con-


struction in Ellis county, Texas

Superconducting Magnet Wire of Niobium-Titanium Ohanian’s


Physics has a photograph of a cross- section of copper wire of diameter 0.7
mm with 2100 filaments of niobium-titanium embedded in it. This is an
approximate sketch of the geometry. Although copper is one of the best
room- temperature conductors, it acts almost as an insulator between the
strands.(shown in fig2.1)

Uses of super conducting magnets


1. Most high energy accelerators now use superconducting magnets.
2. The sub atomic particles can be accelerated near to speed of light by
the use of the super magnets
3. The proton accelerator (proton-antiproton collider) at Fermi lab uses
774 superconducting magnets in a ring of circumference 6.2 kilometers.
Argonne Bubble Chamber
1. As an example of the energy savings attainable with superconducting
magnets.

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Figure 2.3: Superconducting Magnet Coils

2. A bubble chamber at Argonne National Laboratory has a 4.8 meter


diameter magnet producing a magnetic field of 1.8 Tesla.
3. After establishing the magnetic field, only about 190 kW is required to
maintain the liquid helium refrigeration.

2.2 Power Transmission


Almost10% to 15% of generated electricity is dissipated in resistive losses
in transmission lines, the prospect of zero loss superconducting transmis-
sion lines is appealing. In prototype superconducting transmission lines at
Brookhaven National Laboratory, 1000 MW of power can be transported
within an enclosure of diameter 40 cm. This amounts to transporting the
entire output of a large power plant on one enclosed transmission line. This
could be a fairly low voltage DC transmission compared to large transformer
banks and multiple high voltage AC transmission lines on towers in the con-
ventional systems. The superconductor used in these prototype applications
is usually niobium-titanium, and liquid helium cooling is required. Current
experiments with power applications of high-temperature superconductors fo-
cus on uses of BSCCO in tape forms and YBCO in thin film forms. Current
densities above 10,000 amperes persquare centimeter are considered neces-
sary for practical power applications, and this threshold has been exceeded
in several configurations.

Practical examples of super conductivity lines


1. In May of 2001 some 150,000 residents of Copenhagen, Denmark, be-
gan receiving their electricity through HTS (high-temperature super-

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Figure 2.4: Magnetic levitation

conducting) material. That cable was only 30 meters long, but proved
adequate for testing purposes.

2. In the summer of 2001 Pirelli completed installation of three 400-foot


HTS cables for Detroit Edison at the Frisbie Substation capable of
delivering 100 million watts of power. This marked the first time com-
mercial power has been delivered to customers of a US power utility
through superconducting wire.

2.3 Transportation (Maglev Trains)


Magnetic levitation transport, or maglev, is a form of transportation that
suspends, guides and propels vehicles (especially trains) using electromag-
netic force. This method is faster than wheeled mass transit systems, po-
tentially reaching velocities comparable to turboprop and jet aircraft (900
km/h, 559 mph). These trains use superconducting magnets which allow for
a larger gap, and repulsive-type Electro-Dynamic Suspension (EDS). It is
not practical to lay down superconducting rails, it is possible to construct a
superconducting system onboard a train to repel conventional rails shown in
fig 2.4.

MAGLEV vehicles based on superconducting magnets operate with sim-


ple coils of superconducting wire and compact cryogenic coolers. Maglev is
highly reliable, and operates in a highly redundant manner with a very large
margin of safety.

The maglev trains uses a commercially manufactured NbTi superconduc-


tor, (Maglev magnets).

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Figure 2.5: Japan has a demonstration line in Yamanashi prefecture where
test trains JR-Maglev MLX01 have reached 581 km/h (361 mph), slightly
faster than any wheeled trains

Figure 2.6: Principle of maglev and use of superconductors

The ultra-fine filaments of NbTi alloy, each a few microns in diameter,


are imbedded in a matrix of high electrical conductivity copper. The over-
all diameter of the composite NbTi/copper superconducting wire is typically
about 1 millimeter.

The wire is then wound into an appropriate configuration to form the


Maglev magnet.

Figure 2.7: Cross Sections Of Two Typical Filamantary Composites Of NbTi


In A Copper Matrix

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Figure 2.8: Magnetometer

2.4 Electric Motors


Superconducting motors and generators could be made with a weight of about
one tenth that of conventional devices for the same output.

It is possible to build very large capacity generators for power plants


where structural strength considerations place limits on conventional gener-
ators.

In 1995 the Naval Research Laboratory demonstrated a 167 hp motor with


high-Tc superconducting coils made from Bi-2223. It was tested at 4.2K and
at liquid neon temperature, 28K with 112 hp produced at the higher temper-
ature.SQUIDs (Superconducting Quantum Interfering Devices) are among
the most sensitive devices known to man, certainly the most sensitive mag-
netic field detectors.

The SQUID was introduced by James Zimmerman in the late 1960s.It is


essentially an ultra sensitive detector of magnetic flux, made up of a super-
conducting ring interrupted by one or two Josephson Junctions. A SQUID
is capable of detecting magnetic fields of around 2 pT. It has however been
demonstrated that fields of around 100 fT are also within the scope of a
SQUID It is typically required to be kept at temperatures of around 4.2
Kelvin.The device may be configured as a magnetometer to detect incredibly
small magnetic fields.shown in fig 2.8

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Figure 2.9: Hypres Superconducting Microchip, Incorporating 6000 Joseph-
son Junctions

2.5 Electronics
The National Science Foundation, along with NASA and DARPA and var-
ious universities are currently researching Petaflop” computers. A Petaflop
is a thousand-trillion floating point operations per second. Today’s fastest
computing operations have only reached ”teraflop” speeds - trillions of op-
erations per second. Currently the fastest is one of the IBM Blue Gene L
computers running at 280.6 teraflops per second (with multiple CPU’s). The
fastest single processor is a Lenslet optical DSP running at 8 teraflops It has
been conjectured that devices on the order of 50 nanometers in size along
with unconventional switching mechanisms, such as the Josephson junctions
associated with superconductors, will be necessary to achieve such blistering
speeds. TRW researchers (now Northrop Grumman) have quantified this
further by predicting that 100 billion Josephson junctions on 4000 micropro-
cessors will be necessary to reach 32 petabits per second. These Josephson
junctions are incorporated into field-effect transistors which then become
part of the logic circuits within the processors information. It is, however,
not a foregone conclusion that computers of the future will be built around
superconducting devices.(shown in fig 2.9)

In the electronics industry, ultra-high-performance filters are now being


built. (Since superconducting wire has near zero resistance, even at high
frequencies, many more filter stages can be employed to achieve a desired fre-
quency response. This translates into an ability to pass desired frequencies
and block undesirable frequencies in high-congestion RF (radio frequency)
applications such as cellular telephone systems. ISCO International and Su-
perconductor Technologies are companies currently offering such filters). Su-
perconductors have also been used to make digital circuits (e.g. based on the
Rapid Single Flux Quantum technology) and RF and microwave filters for
mobile phone base stations.

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Figure 2.10: American Superconductor unveiled a 5000-horsepower motor
made with superconducting wire. Even larger 36.5MW HTS ship propulsion

2.6 Military Applications


Smaller motors are being built for NAVY ships using superconducting wire
and tape.
1. HTSC SQUIDS are being used by the U.S. NAVY to detect mines and
submarines.

2. The newest application for HTS wire is in the degaussing of naval


vessels. (Degaussing of a ship’s hull eliminates residual magnetic fields
which might otherwise give away a ship’s presence. In addition to
reduced power requirements, HTS degaussing cable offers reduced size
and weight.

3. The most ignominious military use of superconductors may come with


the deployment of ”E-bombs”. These are devices that make use of
strong, superconductor-derived magnetic fields to create a fast, high-
intensity electro-magnetic pulse (EMP) to disable an enemy’s electronic
equipment.

4. The military is also looking at using superconductive tape as a means


of reducing the length of very low frequency antennas employed on
submarines. Normally, the lower the frequency, the longer an antenna
must be. However, inserting a coil of wire ahead of th

5. Antenna will make it function as if it were much longer. Unfortunately,


this loading coil also increases system losses by adding the resistance
in the coil’s wire. Using superconductive materials can significantly
reduce losses in this coil.

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6. Applications engineers suggest that superconducting carbon Nanotubes
might be an ideal Nano-antenna for high-gigahertz and terahertz fre-
quencies, once a method of achieving zero ”on tube” contact resistance
is perfected.

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Chapter 3

conclusion

All of this is, of course, contingent upon a linear growth rate. Should new su-
perconductors with higher transition temperatures be discovered, growth and
development in this exciting field could explode virtually overnight.The fu-
ture melding of superconductors into our daily lives will also depend to a great
degree on advancements in the field of cryogenic cooling.New, high-efficiency
magneto caloric-effect compounds such as gadolinium-silicon-germanium are
expected to enter the marketplace soon. Such materials should make pos-
sible compact, refrigeration units to facilitate additional HTS applications.
Another impetus to the wider use of superconductors is political in nature.
The reduction of green-house gas (GHG) emissions has becoming a topical
issue due to the Kyoto Protocol which requires the European Union (EU) to
reduce its emissions by 8% from 1990 levels by 2012. Physicists in Finland
have calculated that the EU could reduce carbon dioxide emissions by up
to 53 million tons if high-temperature superconductors were used in power
plants.

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Chapter 4

Reference

1. S.M.Szed, Physics of Semiconductor, Wiley Eastern Ltd, New Delhi(1988).

2. American Chemical Society, Chemistry of High Temperature Super-


conductor, Washington.D.C.Vol.XI,1987.

3. Hunt Daniel V, Superconductivity Source Book, John Wiley and Sons.inc.1989.

4. M Deppu, High Temperature Superconducting Material, New York,


1988.

5. Power Application of Superconductivity, IEEE explorer.org/ielis/852/2490.

6. Van Dozer and Turner C.W., Principles of Superconductive Devices


and Circuits, London, Arnold,1981.

7. Schechter, Bruce. The Path of No Resistance, Simon and Schuster,1987.

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