Speaker
Description
In my talk I will illustrate the studies carried out at INFN-Ferrara on a novel idea of using bulk $\rm{MgB_2}$ superconductor as replacement of conventional superconducting magnets in particle physics experiments.
The advantages of this technology are many: possibility to use almost arbitrary shape/size; no need of current leads (reduced heat-load and size); no power consumption (beyond cooling) once stable conditions are reached; high magnetic field (with preset setup we easily reached ~1 T with limited material budget, few mm of $\rm{MgB_2}$ only, since the copper quench shield is not required).
Furthermore it can be used both as a magnet (i.e. to generate/trap a magnetic field, for example to hold the polarization of a target) and also as a shield from strong external fields.
I will present the studies initiated on a first tube of $\rm{MgB_2}$ (actually a scrap, with irregular shape) and continued with new samples produced with different "recipes" and dimensions.
The results are promising in both configurations: with an external dipole field of ~ 1T, a trapped field of ~0.9T or a shielding of 90% (thus measuring a penetrating field of only ~0.1T) could be obtained despite the unconventional geometry (tube).