Doors open to cutting-edge magnetic field facilities
High magnetic fields can be used to investigate a material's magnetic and electronic properties, making them highly relevant in all areas of physics, chemistry and biology. While many investigations require commonly available magnet technologies such as magnetic resonance imaging, others rely on fields only available at a limited number of high magnetic field facilities around the world, where the potential for discovery is the greatest. The EUROMAGNET II project has encouraged and coordinated transnational access to all European large infrastructures for high magnetic fields. A common access request procedure and selection committee have been created for this coordinated use, which will result in optimal use of capacity and increased user satisfaction. During the project duration, 86 % more access for European users has been realised than originally anticipated. To further expand the high field user community, five user meetings, three workshops and three summer schools have been organised. Dissemination also included the publication of a quarterly magazine on new developments at the EUROMAGNET II facilities for all potential European high magnetic field users. EUROMAGNET II has conducted three joint research activities to improve the facilities. These have enhanced the performance of the technical installations, determined properties of individual nanostructures and increased nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) sensitivity. Important improvements in field noise and drift have been obtained, and a detailed study of the heat exchange in direct current (DC) magnets has been performed. The researchers also designed radial access pulsed magnets for use in X-ray, neutron and laser scattering as well as improved homogeneity magnets for pulsed-field NMR. Set-ups to perform transport measurements on single nano objects in pulsed magnetic fields, and single nano-object luminescence and Kerr imaging in DC fields were tested and made available for use by external users. The importance of nanostructures is increasing rapidly and key examples are in the fields of semiconductor quantum dots and nanotubes. Enhancement of NMR sensitivity compensates for the high cost of resistive DC magnetic fields and the limited duty cycles of pulsed magnetic fields. EUROMAGNET II devised several methods to improve NMR sensitivity and throughput, including the use of cryogenic low-noise preamplifiers and dynamic nuclear polarisation. The first pulsed field NMR experiment on a realistic sample, a cuprate high-temperature superconductor, was successfully performed. Structuring and strengthening European research in high magnetic fields, EUROMAGNET II expects to contribute to the long-term development of the EU's knowledge-based economy.
Keywords
High magnetic field, transnational access, large infrastructures, nanostructures, NMR sensitivity
