Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Zhang, D
• Sumption, M D
• Majoros, M
• Kovacs, C
• Collings, E W
• Panik, D
• Rindfleisch, M
• Doll, D
• Tomsic, M
• Poole, C
• Martens, M

Titel

Quench, Normal Zone Propagation Velocity, and the Development of an Active Protection Scheme for a Conduction Cooled, R&W, MgB2 MRI Coil Segment

Ist Teil von

• Superconductor science & technology, 2019-12, Vol.32 (12)

Erscheinungsjahr

2019

Quelle

Alma/SFX Local Collection

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• The development of coils that can survive a quench is crucial for demonstrating the viability of MgB 2 -based main magnet coils used in MRI systems. Here we have studied the performance and quench properties of a large (outer diameter: 901 mm; winding pack: 44 mm thick × 50.6 mm high) conduction-cooled, react-and-wind (R&W), MgB 2 superconducting coil. Minimum quench energy (MQE) values were measured at several coil operating currents ( I op ), and distinguished from the minimum energy needed to generate a normal zone (MGE). During these measurements, normal zone propagation velocities (NZPV) were also determined using multiple voltage taps placed around the heater zone. The conduction cooled coil obtained a critical current ( I c ) of 186 A at 15 K. As the operating currents ( I op ) varied from 80 A to 175 A, MQE ranged from 152 J to 10 J, and NZPV increased from 1.3 to 5.5 cm/s. Two kinds of heater were involved in this study: (1) a localized heater (“test heater”) used to initiate the quench, and (2) a larger “protection heater” used to protect the coil by distributing the normal zone after a quench was detected. The protection heater was placed on the outside surface of the coil winding. The test heater was also placed on the outside surface of the coil at a small opening made in the protection heater. As part of this work, we also developed and tested an active protection scheme for the coil. Such active protection schemes are of great interest for MgB 2 -based MRIs because they permit exploitation of the relatively large MQE values of MgB 2 to enable the use of higher J e values which in turn lead to competitive MgB 2 MRI designs. Finally, the ability to use a quench detection voltage to fire a protection heater as part of an active protection scheme was also demonstrated.