No Arabic abstract
Electric machines with very power-to-weight ratios are inevitable for hybrid electric aircraft applications. One potential technology that is very promising to achieve the required power-to-weight ratio for short-range aircraft, are superconductors used for high current densities in the stator or high magnetic fields in the rotor. In this paper, we present an indepth analysis of the potential for fully and partially superconducting electric machines that is based on an analytical approach taking into account all relevant physical domains such as electromagnetics, superconducting properties, thermal behavior as well as structural mechanics. For the requirements of the motors in the NASA N3-X concept aircraft, we find that fully superconducting machines could achieve 3.5 times higher power-to-weight ratio than partially superconducting machines. Furthermore, our model can be used to calculate the relevant KPIs such as mass, efficiency and cryogenic cooling requirements for any other machine design.
Fully superconducting machines provide the high power density required for future electric aircraft propulsion. However, superconducting windings generate AC losses in AC electrical machine environments. These AC losses are difficult to remove at low temperatures and they add an extra burden to the aircraft cooling system. Due to heavy cooling penalty, AC losses in the HTS stator, is one of the key topics in HTS machine design. In order to evaluate the AC loss of superconducting stator windings in a rotational machine environment, we designed and built a novel axial-flux high temperature superconducting (HTS) machine platform. The AC loss measurement is based on calorimetrically boiling-off liquid nitrogen. Both total AC loss and magnetisation loss in HTS stator are measured in a rotational magnetic field condition. This platform is essential to study ways to minimise AC losses in HTS stator, in order to maximum the efficiency of fully HTS machines.
The use of high-temperature superconductors in electric machines offers potentially large gains in performance compared to conventional conductors, but also comes with unique challenges. Here, the electromagnetic properties of superconducting electric machines with bulk HTS trapped-field magnets in the rotor and conventional copper coils in the stator are investigated. To this end, an analytical model of the electromagnetic field in radial air-gap synchronous electric machines is developed and validated, taking into account the specific difficulties that occur in the treatment of machines with bulk HTS. Using this model, the influence of pole pair number, stator winding thickness, rotor surface coverage, and air gap width on the machines Esson coefficient is calculated. In contrast to numerical simulations, the method presented here can provide results within minutes, making it particularly useful for work in early development and systems engineering, where large parameter spaces must be investigated quickly.
We exploit the recent proposals for the light-induced superconductivity mediated by a Bose-Einstein condensate of exciton-polaritons to design a superconducting fiber that would enable long-distance transport of a supercurrent at elevated temperatures. The proposed fiber consists of a conventional core made of a silica glass with the first cladding layer formed by a material sustaining dipole-polarised excitons with a binding energy exceeding 25 meV. To be specific, we consider a perovskite cladding layer of 20 nm width. The second cladding layer is made of a conventional superconductor such as aluminium. The fiber is covered by a conventional coating buffer and by a plastic outer jacket. We argue that the critical temperature for a superconducting phase transition in the second cladding layer may be strongly enhanced due to the coupling of the superconductor to a bosonic condensate of exciton-polaritons optically induced by the evanescent part of the guiding mode confined in the core. The guided light mode would penetrate to the first cladding layer and provide the strong exciton-photon coupling regime. We run simulations that confirm the validity of the proposed concept. The fabrication of superconducting fibers where a high-temperature superconductivity could be controlled by light would enable passing superconducting currents over extremely long distances.
Due to their unique properties as lossless, nonlinear circuit elements, Josephson junctions lie at the heart of superconducting quantum information processing. Previously, we demonstrated a two-layer, submicrometer-scale overlap junction fabrication process suitable for qubits with long coherence times. Here, we extend the overlap junction fabrication process to micrometer-scale junctions. This allows us to fabricate other superconducting quantum devices. For example, we demonstrate an overlap-junction-based Josephson parametric amplifier that uses only 2 layers. This efficient fabrication process yields frequency-tunable devices with negligible insertion loss and a gain of ~ 30 dB. Compared to other processes, the overlap junction allows for fabrication with minimal infrastructure, high yield, and state-of-the-art device performance.
Superconducting nanowire single photon detectors (SNSPDs) have advanced various frontier scientific and technological fields such as quantum key distribution and deep space communications. However, limited by available cooling technology, all past experimental demonstrations have had ground-based applications. In this work we demonstrate a SNSPD system using a hybrid cryocooler compatible with space applications. With a minimum operational temperature of 2.8 K, this SNSPD system presents a maximum system detection efficiency of over 50% and a timing jitter of 48 ps, which paves the way for various space applications.