First commercial application of NbTi superconductor employing artificial pinning centers

Supercon Inc. has fabricated two 200-mm. multifilamentary billets of niobium-titanium wire for winding into a magnet for GE Medical Systems' magnetic resonance imagers. The superconductors, which were prepared via the artificial pinning center process, demonstrated 'excellent piece length and high critical current densities.' In contrast, the magnets exhibited higher drift levels due, it is assumed, to higher joint resistivity, poor filament quality or flux creep.