MagLab Creates World’s Strongest Magnet

By: | July 28th, 2019

Image courtesy (National High Magnetic Field Laboratory)

In a big breakthrough, researchers from National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (MagLab) at Florida State University have created the world’s strongest magnetic field using a toilet paper roll-sized magnet which is less than a centimeter thick.

A new superconducting magnet, created by MagLab engineer Seungyong Hahn has generated a world-record 45.5 tesla magnetic field. Magnetic field generated is even more than 20 times the strength of a hospital MRI magnet.

For the sake of clarity, our flimsy fridge magnets have about 1 percent of a single tesla

This is a huge achievement, researchers are very excited and they hope it will bring magnetic revolution.

 MagLab Director Greg Boebinger said in a statement, “This is indeed a miniaturization milestone that could potentially do for magnets what silicon has done for electronics,”

“This creative technology could lead to small magnets that do big jobs in places like particle detectors, nuclear fusion reactors and diagnostic tools in medicine.”

How they achieved such a strong magnetic field:

Hahn and his team’s research, achieved such a strong field by using a promising, new conductor and a novel magnet design. New compound called REBCO (rare earth barium copper oxide), with many advantages over conventional superconductors was used to make the magnet’s superconductors. REBCO can carry twice as much current as same sized superconductors used for previous record-breaking magnets and therefore increasing the magnetic field strength.

Nidhi Goyal

Nidhi is a gold medalist Post Graduate in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences.

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