Researchers develop world’s strongest iron-based superconducting magnet
Smaller and more affordable MRI machines and advanced electrified transport could be possible with the world’s strongest iron-based superconducting magnet developed by an international team of scientists.
Superconducting magnets produce strong, stable magnetic fields without the need for large amounts of power, which makes them suitable for technologies such as MRI machines that require a strong magnetic field to produce 3D images of soft tissue. They can also be used in the next generation of transport, including the SCMaglev train system in Japan.
A drawback is that the superconductors currently used are primarily in the form of large coils of superconducting niobium-tin alloy wire and the devices using them need to accommodate this size.
Now, King’s College London (KCL), Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, the Japan Science and Technology Agency, the National Institute for Materials Science and Kyushu University have fabricated a cheap and powerful iron-based superconducting magnet using machine learning (ML), which could lead to widespread and affordable use of the technology. The team’s findings have been published in NPG Asia Materials.
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