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The group has two well听equipped听laboratories containing:
- Two liquid helium based adiabatic demagnetisation refrigerators (ADR) which provide temperatures from 40mK to 4K.听
- One of the ADRs has a 2 Tesla magnet installed in the sample test space for the investigation of the sample in a magnetic field. 听The sample can be investigated in-situ from 40 mK to 4 K with a magnetic field of up to 2 Tesla.
One of our ADR work stations:
- Several liquid helium cryostats.
- Several pulse tube cooled cryostats. These provide cryogen free and rapid cooling from room temperature to 4 K in 2 hours.
- Equipment for the听measurement听of听electrical听resistivity at liquid helium temperature and residual resistance ratio (RRR) a key measure of the quality of metals.
- Numerous thermometer readout electronics (AVS47 bridges) and temperature controllers.
- Our own liquid helium and nitrogen storage dewars.
Eddy currents in a tungsten magnetoresitive heat switch:
- The engineering model听ESA flight ADR听(manufactured by the group for ESA in association with Astrium) on loan from ESA. This system has a base temperature of 25 mK and is used for the testing of components in a flight representative ADR as part of our space cooler programme.听
In addition听we have:
- Opera听2d听and听3d听finite element听electromagnetic听modelling software. 听This we use for the modelling of magnetic fields from 听solenoid magnets (as used in our ADRs), eddy current heating, and simple 3d 听thermal modelling (for more advanced applications we develop our own mathematical thermal models to aid design).
- In house ADR mathematical models developed by the group听as a design tool听in order to accurately predict the performance of ADRs under design or operation in new听configurations.