Monthly Archives: September 2015

Superconduction With Stinks — A New Temperature Record

Back around 1960, at school I enjoyed a laboratory lecture on liquid nitrogen, watching a deep frozen squash ball being shattered at a temperature well below that at which it turns from a rubber into a glass, and then seeing … Continue reading

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APS Liquid Helium Purchasing Program Progress

Scientists at West Texas A&M University used to worry about gaining access to the liquid helium necessary to operate their nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometers. “We were concerned because we are both a new customer and a small customer,” recalled Catherine … Continue reading

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Helium Gas Permeability Measurements Of Polymeric Membranes Using The Difference Method

This paper presents a new permeation measurement facility based on the difference method, which is shown to be capable of measuring gas fluxes through different polymeric membranes. In order to correct for the background pressure increase in the measurement chamber, … Continue reading

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Future Supply Of Helium

Helium has many applications. It is mainly used for cooling of electromagnets in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), CERN’s particle accelerator. Other applications include welding, party balloons, and weather balloons. Helium is produced by … Continue reading

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Numerical Investigation of Second Sound in Liquid Helium

At temperatures below 2.17K the phenomenon of thermal waves has been observed in liquid Helium. This paper describes the reproduction of these waves, called “Second Sound,” by means of simulation. Two different models for the heat transport in Helium are … Continue reading

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