eReport

November 2007

Order Your Industry Directory Today!!

BI Technologies Develops Ferrite Core Inductor Capable of Operation at High Switching Frequencies

TT Electronics BI Technologies Magnetic Components Division, a global manufacturer of magnetic transformers, inductors, transceivers and common mode chokes, has developed a through hole ferrite core inductor. Designated the HM37 series, the inductor is housed in a small bead package designed for automatic pick and place equipment.

“The bead package provides low core losses and low DCR losses in a very cost-effective design,” said David Smolik, director of product development for BI Technologies Magnetic Components Division. “Additionally, the ferrite core enables the device to operate at high switching frequencies, making the overall package ideal for desktop voltage regulator applications, including powering microprocessors.

Typical pricing for the HM37 Series through hole inductor is less than $0.50 in quantities of 25,000. Lead time is from stock to 12 weeks.

Vacuumschmelze GmbH & Co. KG ( Hanau) is supplying VACODYM magnet systems for a project at Eindhoven Technical University concerning the development of a new type of linear drive. Research engineers in the project, which has the working title “Flying Carpet”, are attempting to suspend an aluminium platform in a magnetic field as if by magic. The key to the project is a planar electromagnetic drive, which enables a magnetic platform to move without physical contact. VAC developed a special assembly concept for the permanent magnets used in the project.

The specifications were challenging: in order to minimize the force acting on the moving object, magnetic components with the lowest possible weight were required. VAC solved the problem by designing a Halbach-style “chessboard” geometry.

The test setup constructed by the Eindhoven scientists had a positioning accuracy so high that it was undetectable using available measuring sensors. Positional stability can be maintained within 0.3 0m and 1 0rad, with a position detection error of 20 0m for acceleration of 1 m/s. The magnetic platform achieves a maximum achievable speed of 1.4 m/s, equal to a respectable 5 km/h at 1.4 g maximum acceleration.

The development of the “Flying Carpet“ promises to open up new areas of applications for the future in the field of contactless controlled movement of structures in high vacuum. In a next step the Eindhoven researchers plan to place a signal processing system on the moving magnetic platform – with thehelp of VAC.

Researchers at Purdue and Duke universities have developed a technique that uses a magnetic field to selectively separate tiny magnetic particles, representing a highly sensitive method for potentially diagnosing disease by testing samples from patients.

Because different pathogens could be attracted to specific-size magnetic particles and the new technique can selectively separate particles by size, the method could be used to diagnose the presence of many diseases in a single sample, said Gil Lee, a professor of chemical and biomedical engineering at Purdue.

The micron-size magnetic particles have been coated with antibodies that attract certain pathogens and are then mixed with blood samples from patients. A critical piece of the technology is a microchip containing an array of metal disks as wide as 5 microns, or millionths of a meter. The magnetic particles are dispersed in a liquid placed in a container housing the chip. The container is surrounded by three electromagnets energized in sequence to produce a rotating magnetic field.

As the magnetic field rotates, the particles move from one disk to another until they are separated from the rest of the sample. Rotating the magnetic field at specific speeds separates only particles of certain sizes, meaning pathogens attached to those particles would be separated from the sample by varying the rotation speed, Lee said.

In recent experiments, samples containing magnetic particles attached to yeast were placed inside the rotating magnetic field and separated from the rest of the samples. Findings are detailed in a research paper appearing online this month in Lab on a Chip magazine and in the December print edition of the publication. The paper was written by assistant professor Benjamin Yellen, graduate students Randall Erb and H. Son, and undergraduate student R. Hewlin Jr., all from Duke University's Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science, and postdoctoral fellow Hao Shang and Lee, both from Purdue's School of Chemical Engineering and Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering.

The technique, called non-linear magnetophoretic separation, works using an array of disks made of cobalt and coated with chromium to prevent corrosion. The disks are regularly, or periodically, spaced on the surface of the silicon chip.

The biotechnology industry currently uses magnetic particles to make drugs by separating components in biological materials. The particles attract specific types of molecules, such as proteins and DNA, and then a magnet is used to separate them from the rest of the sample.

The new approach, however, aims to use the particles not for research but for medical diagnostics or possibly to detect biological materials in environmental samples.

The micron-size magnetic particles, which are made of thousands of nanometer-size particles, have a property called superparamagnetism. This means the particles are not magnetic unless they are in a magnetic field, so they can be mixed in a solution without attracting each other and clumping together, which is critical for them to be distributed uniformly throughout the solution. But as soon as the rotating magnetic field is applied, the particles become magnetic, which enables them to be separated.

"What some people are doing very successfully is attaching antibodies that recognize pathogens like bacteria and viruses to these magnetic particles," Lee said. "One of the things we've been working on for quite a long time is to identify many different pathogens simultaneously."

Such an innovation represents a powerful new tool for medical diagnostics.

"When you walk into a doctor's office, the problem is that it could be one of five or six different pathogens giving you the symptoms," Lee said. "The doctor cannot determine which pathogen you have, so they simply give you a broad-spectrum antibiotic or tell you to go home and get some rest. There clearly is a need for technology that can recognize multiple pathogens simultaneously and at very low levels. It is likely they will be chip-based technologies that are easy to implement in medical environments."

The particles are said to move in a "non-linear" fashion because their motion does not simply increase as the speed of the rotating magnetic field increases.

"There is a surprising effect where at some point the particles stop moving due to their size or what they are attached to, and we can use this effect to our advantage," Lee said. "This effect will allow us to quickly sort through a million particles and say that one's got a certain bacterium on it, that one's got a virus on it, and so on."

The disks are aligned so that their poles point in the same direction. The particles are drawn across the chip as they are attracted by the magnetic fields emanating from the poles and resulting from the external rotating magnetic field.

Different size particles have different "critical frequencies," which means they are moved across the chip by rotating the external magnetic field at specific speeds matching those frequencies.

"So, at a certain frequency, you will see larger particles moving and smaller particles just sort of jitter back and forth," Lee said.

This frequency is higher for larger particles than it is for smaller particles, so speeding up and slowing down the rotation of the external magnetic field causes particles to move based on their size.

"Say we would like to sort out 50 different magnetic particle sizes, and we could put a different antibody on each one," Lee said. "Then each one would react with a different pathogen. It might have one for dengue virus, one for West Nile virus, and that way I could add them to a blood sample from a patient and sort them out within two minutes."

Lee's work is based at the Birck Nanotechnology Center at Purdue's Discovery Park. The research has been supported by the Institute for Nanoelectronics and Computing, funded by NASA and located at Discovery Park. Hewlin's participation as an undergraduate was supported by the National Science Foundation.

Sandia’s Z machine during the renovation process, its huge conduits being readied to focus an even more massive electrical current on a target approximately the size of a spool of thread.

Sandia National Laboratories’ Z machine, the world’s largest producer of X-rays, shook the ground for several hundred yards in every direction for the first time since July 2006, when the 22-year-old facility was gutted to undergo a complete refurbishment at a total project cost of $90 million.

Z has been overbooked in recent years with requests for experiment time from national labs, universities and the international community. The facility is in demand because of Z’s capability to subject materials to immense pressures, compress spherical capsules to produce thermonuclear fusion reactions, fire objects much faster than a rifle bullet and produce data for models of nuclear weapons effects — as well as, more arcanely, the conditions surrounding black holes in space. Given its complex mission, it was time for a more modern Z.

The improved version is capable of firing more often, at higher energies, and with improved precision. Sandia is a National Nuclear Security Administration laboratory.

The new facility — optimized for both z-pinch and material properties work — will increase the strength of its electrical pulse from 18 million amps to an anticipated 26 million amps. The facility also now offers improved control over the shape of its electrical pulse for better reproducibility as it enters new experimental regimes.

A z-pinch is so named because the large current passing in the vertical direction — the Z direction in cylindrical geometry — creates a magnetic field that pinches together the ions of thin wires that serve as electrical conductors until the current vaporizes them.

The 17.5-million-amp shot that signified the reopening of the facility was used to test new system components. It concluded an extensive facility outage during which the old pulsed power systems were removed, and the tank structure that contains the accelerator was extensively modified. New, more robust pulsed power components and subsystems were installed. Utility infrastructure modifications were made, and the accelerator subsystems were commissioned. Over the next several months, Z will conduct more tests to verify, validate, and optimize the performance and predictive models for the accelerator and determine reliable operating points for science program operation, the ultimate purpose for Z.

Z during the renovation process, with new conduits and switches being installed.

Z’s roots go back to 1985 when it was constructed as the Particle Beam Fusion Accelerator II (PBFA II), designed for light-ion fusion research. Lithium ions were shot at a target. Z-pinch technology breakthroughs used simple electricity and the z-pinch effect. Improvements led to modifying the center portion of the machine in 1996 to utilize this approach to successfully produce high energy density environments.

Renamed “Z,” the accelerator became a workhorse for the nation’s scientific community but faced operational efficiency limits due to the age of the hardware and a pulsed power drive system that was not specifically designed for z-pinch applications.

Dubbed the Z Refurbishment Project (ZR), the huge effort to modify the accelerator began with extensive design and development activity in 2002. For the first time, the detailed component design depended heavily on three-dimensional simulations of their performance.

Improvements included new capacitors that doubled the energy storage capability within the same physical volume, and stainless steel, electrically optimized pulsed power components for durability.

Sadly for graphic artists (but not for engineers), Z will no longer provide those dramatic “arcs and sparks” photographs that have been the signature image of visual recognition for the old facility. The water-air interface that provided these visuals is now covered in decking that will eventually be filled up with diagnostic and recording equipment.

And that is proper, says Ed Weinbrecht, the effort’s project manager: “The ultimate deliverable from the facility is high quality data in support of scientific advances in high energy density-based physics.”

It’s time to Vote for the 2007 MB&T Innova Awards

Magnetics Business & Technology is pleased to announce the first annual Innova Awards. These awards are designed to recognize companies that are striving for excellence and are achieving technology breakthroughs. Nominations have been selected for the following categories.

Visit http://www.magneticsmagazine.com/mag_innova.php to vote for your favorites now!

Votes will be accepted until November 23rd.

Industry Leadership
This award goes to the company that has shown a commitment to excellence and is a leading innovator in the magnetics industry.

Product Development Excellence
This award goes to the product that shows the most innovation and cutting-edge technology.

Best Technology
This award goes to the technology that has the most promise of impacting/improving the magnetics industry.

Outstanding Application
This award goes to magnet that have been successfully integrated and performed in an end-product. Don’t see your product nominated this year - Nominate your company in 2008!

 2008 Magnetics Conference Call for Presentations – Deadline Reminder!

Submit your abstract for consideration in the 2008 Magnetics Conference program by November 16, 2007. We are looking for presentations focused on the latest advancements in magnetic applications, technology and materials.

Full-conference registration fees will be waived for all confirmed speakers.  

SUBMISSIONS SOUGHT FOR:

Subject areas to include, but not limited to:

• Testing & Instrumentation • Magnetic Materials • Power Electronics • EMI / EMC / Shielding • Magnetic Assembly & Mfg • Brakes • Motors • Data Storage • Nano Magnetics • Ferrites • Sensors & Motion Control • Metrology • Electro-Magnetic Software • Magnetic Components • Magnetic Equipment • Specialized Coatings & Adhesives • Biomagnetics • Superconducting Magnets • Cryogenics

Other Areas of Coverage to Include:

• Materials Pricing & Economic Development
• New Frontiers in Magnetics Research & Development
• Emerging Technologies that utilize Magnetics

Visit the conference web site at http://www.magneticsmagazine.com/mag_conf08_callforpres.htm for abstract submission requirements and guidelines.

Contact Heather Krier at heatherk@infowebcom.com or 800-803-9488 x129 for more information.

Interested in Sponsoring or Exhibiting?

Contact Joan Nelson for more information at joann@infowebcom.com or 800-803-9488 x113.

At the Fall Technical Conference of SMMA – The Motor & Motion Association, held October 10, 2007 in Louisville, Kentucky, a group of magnet producers and magnetic distributors and fabricators voted to form a Permanent Magnet Division (PMD) as part of the SMMA organization.

The group intends that this organization will fill the void that occurred when the Permanent Magnet Division of the International Magnetics Association (IMA) discontinued their affiliation with IMA in 2006. The mission of this new SMMA division is to increase the understanding, promotion and effective utilization of magnetic materials, assemblies and systems for the benefit of the Permanent Magnet Division members and all users of permanent magnet products.

The next regular meeting of PMD will be held at SMMA’s Spring Management Conference to be held May 7-9, 2008 in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. The PMD meeting will be held at 2:30-5:00 PM on May 7, 2008. All interested members of the permanent magnet community are welcome to attend this meeting.

SMMA - The Motor & Motion Association is a manufacturing trade association whose core membership is electric motor and motion control companies. The membership of more than 120 also includes suppliers, users and associated businesses such as consultants, universities, and distributors.

For more about SMMA, visit www.smma.org.

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN (the European Centre for Nuclear Research) near Geneva, Switzerland, has engaged AEi Systems to design and develop a radiation-hard power supply for CERN’s giant ATLAS particle detector. The LHC will be the world’s largest and most powerful particle accelerator when it begins anticipated operations in 2008.

The contract was awarded by the US Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory, which heads the US ATLAS collaboration. AEi Systems joined forces with Algen Design Services, a specialty electronics manufacturer, to win the design project.

The ATLAS experiment at the LHC will take place in a unit the size of a 7-story building and will cause protons to collide in and near the ATLAS particle detector at record energies of 7 TeV (7 trillion electronvolts) per proton.

The power supply for ATLAS is located close to the front-end crate of its liquid-argon calorimeters and therefore the power supply will have to perform in one of the most challenging environments on Earth, facing high radiation (up to 100 krad), single-event effects (hadrons with E>10MeV) and a large magnetic field (300 Gauss). Radiation causes most commercial power supplies to short out in the 10 to 30 krad range due to degradation of the internal semiconductor devices used in feedback loop and switching transistors. In addition, magnetic fields can cause the power supply’s magnetics to saturate.

When CERN scientists needed a design for a 3 kW DC-DC converter that could survive the high-radiation and magnetic field environment of ATLAS, AEi Systems’ extensive experience with space-grade radiation-hardened power electronics made it a top resource. What made this design assignment even more challenging than the already difficult-to-achieve operational specification requirements was that ATLAS scientists also wanted a lower-cost solution with a price-point closer to that of commercial units. This goal was set even though radiation-tolerant military and space power supplies traditionally use very expensive parts that have been specially designed and tested for their ability to survive in such environments.

Despite these challenges, AEi Systems, together with Algen, was able to provide a high-grade solution that uses less expensive “off-the-shelf” parts through application of unique design concepts and topologies along with careful component selection supported by radiation testing.

“We are very proud and excited that AEi Systems has been selected to design this very important power supply,” said Charles Hymowitz, managing director of AEi Systems. “AEi Systems’ record of space and satellite achievement is especially applicable when customers need products to operate reliably under such harsh radiation conditions. The development of this robust power supply using ‘off-the-shelf’ parts is a landmark achievement in power supply design.”

ATLAS is one of the largest collaborative efforts ever attempted in the physical sciences, with participation from 2,000 physicists from more than 167 universities and laboratories in 37 countries. Further information about the ATLAS Collaboration can be found at http://atlas.ch.

Simpleware Ltd. and COMSOL, Inc. have partnered to provide an export interface from Simpleware's 3D image-based meshing software +ScanFE to COMSOL Multiphysics 3.4, the industry's foremost multiphysics simulation environment. The interface enables biomedical and bioengineering users to directly export high-quality meshes of 3D MRI (magnetic resonance imaging), CT (computed tomography), and MicroCT (microcomputed tomography) scan data created with +ScanFE to COMSOL Multiphysics 3.4 for modeling and simulation without requiring re-meshing or pre-processing.

"We are striving to provide best-in-class software solutions for all design, simulation, and product development needs," said Philippe Young, MD of Simpleware. "The partnership with COMSOL will further enhance our position as the leading provider of tools for the conversion of 3D images to simulation models."

A key component of Simpleware's ScanIP(TM) suite of image-processing solutions, +ScanFE provides a powerful suite of algorithms and a robust toolset for converting segmented 3D image data into multi-part volumetric models. +ScanFE generates high-quality volume and surface meshes, contact surfaces, and material properties from the segmented data, all of which can now be directly exported to COMSOL Multiphysics.

Simpleware's new Export to COMSOL Multiphysics functionality is a simple two-step operation. First, ScanIP segments the regions of interest from the scan data, and then +ScanFE generates an input file for COMSOL Multiphysics. Once you import the file, you can leverage COMSOL to model, simulate, and to design biomedical applicationssuch as hip joint replacements, vascular therapy, and drug delivery.

"The ability to create multiphysics models from MRI data is something that many of our biomed and bioengineering users have demanded," said Ed Fontes, VP of Applications at COMSOL. "This new cooperation with Simpleware places COMSOL Multiphysics on the leading edge of biomedical and bioengineering modeling, design, and simulation."

The combination of Simpleware's +ScanFE and COMSOL provides users across the biomechanics and materials science disciplines with an indispensable tool. Key benefits of the +ScanFE and COMSOL Multiphysics partnership include:

- The unique ability to create meshes from 3D scan data, such as MRI, CT and MicroCT, and directly make them available for true multiphysics simulations without intermediate steps such as re-meshing and pre-processing.

- The possibility to integrate CAD and image data interactively and then automatically mesh the resulting combined model. Users can insert implants and blood stents into the original scan data and then run simulations involving complex interactions between implant, tissue, and blood.

- The capability to reconstruct and mesh separate parts yielding perfectly conforming interfaces (no gaps or overlaps). The properties and physics of the different parts and the interactions across the

interfaces can be fully manipulated in the model set-up.

- The capacity for users to access application examples and exercises that lead them through the entire process from acquiring and exporting 3D scan data to full multiphysics modeling of complex geometries with multiple parts.

Ansoft Corp. has released a new library of permanent magnet materials from Shin-Etsu Magnetics, Inc. for its Maxwell electromagnetic field simulation software. The library contains more than 31 high-performance permanent magnets defined at different operating temperatures using rare earth elements that can be downloaded by Ansoft customers and are ready for use within Maxwell.

Brad Lucas, national sales manager for Shin-Etsu's Magnetic Materials Research Center, said, "We are pleased our industry-leading materials are now included in Ansoft's Maxwell. We believe this will be very beneficial to those wishing to design magnetic circuits utilizing the most advanced materials currently available."

Permanent magnet materials are used in many applications, including motors, sensors and actuators. Maxwell users now have access to the latest materials from Shin-Etsu to use directly within their simulations of new or existing designs.

"The ability to have access to accurate material properties is very important for our customers," said Scott Stanton, technical director at Ansoft. "Often users must contact the material vendor directly to obtain the measurements, and commonly they do not have accurate or complete measurement data available. Shin-Etsu working with Ansoft makes it very convenient for our global customer base to evaluate the performance of their materials within a design simulated in Maxwell."

Customers can download the library by logging in to Ansoft's Online Technical Support site at www.ansoft.com/ots.

The MB&T Knowledge Center is a place you will find the latest information and resources for the magnetics industry including white papers, webinars, archived articles, market reports, training courses, standards/regulations, industry links, literature & books, R&D and a calendar of events. Check back often as we are continually updating the content. http://www.magneticsmagazine.com/m-knowledgecenter.htm

Please send new information or content to be posted in the Knowledge Center to Heather Krier at heatherk@infowebcom.com.

11/26 - 11/30
2007 MRS Fall Meeting
Boston, MA

To be removed from this distribution list please click here
To change the status of any contact information, call 720-528-3770.