Multiply the magnetic field strength of a refrigerator magnet by 2 million and you’ll be in the ballpark of the strength of the magnet that researchers at the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory are trying to create. When completed later this year, the pulsed electromagnet, located at the lab’s facility at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, in New Mexico, will reach 100 tesla, the holy grail of magnetic field strength. And in another first, if all goes according to plan it will reach that level—about 67 times as high as a typical MRI—without blowing itself to smithereens.
Why would anyone need a magnet that strong? Greg Boebinger, director of the Magnet Lab, says that this magnetic field strength is the only way to test the properties of newly discovered high-temperature superconductors like iron oxyarsenide, which may improve the performance of MRI machines and high-voltage power lines while lowering their cost. A 100-T magnet would also let you conduct certain zero-gravity experiments without traveling into space and let you develop magnetic propulsion systems that could eventually replace those that burn rocket fuel.
