Novel 4He Circulator for Cooling of Large Space Superconducting Magnets

Large superconducting magnets are used in various space science applications (that is, particle detectors designed to search for antimatter, dark matter, and the origin of cosmic rays in space). To prevent or recover from a potential magnet quench, it is extremely important to control the operating temperature of superconducting magnets. One effective method for maintaining superconducting coils at sufficiently low temperatures while in application is to exchange heat with He-II, which exhibits an abnormally high, effective thermal conductivity (>= 80; 000 W/m . K) under certain conditions. In this work, a novel superfluid magnetic pump with no moving parts is discussed as a new method for maintaining magnet coils below their superconducting transition temperature T-c. Unlike traditionally used thermomechanical pumps, the superfluid magnetic pump will have minimal superfluid helium depletion and will be able to provide flow rates that enable maintaining of the superconducting magnet coils at low temperatures.