The International MegaGauss Science Laboratory, part of the Institute Solid State Physics (ISSP) at the University of Tokyo, is attempting to set a new world record for the highest ever, indoor magnetic field using a Spectrum Instrumentation digitiser.
In order to achieve their record, the ISSP needed to improve the precision of the firing processes with sub-nanosecond measurements, and this is where the Spectrum digitiser came in. The fields were used to study the physical properties of solid-state materials as they were subjected to ultra-high magnetic fields and researching new materials and controlling their phase and functionality. The laboratory’s pulse magnets can currently generate up to 87 Tesla (T) by non-destructive methods, and from 100 T up to 760 T (currently the world record for the strongest field generated indoors) by a destructive process.
To optimise the magnetic fields generated by the laboratory’s MegaGauss machine, the trigger events that fire banks of large capacitors have to be triggered within 10 ns of each other. To achieve this high level of precision, the trigger signals for each capacitor have to be examined to determine their key characteristics and timing relationships to ensure optimal firing every time as the physical parameters of the MegaGauss machine restrict firing to just a few shots per day.
In order to capture and analyse the trigger signals, ISSP required a fully synchronous, 10 channel digitiser system that delivers a single shot sampling rate in excess of 1 Giga Samples per second (GS/s). The high sampling rate allows the shape and frequency content of individual trigger pulses to be revealed, while fully synchronous sampling ensures inter-channel timing measurements can be consistently made with sub-nanosecond precision.
A further complication was the fact that the MegaGauss machine generates dangerously high magnetic fields that are potentially unsafe and can easily interfere with the measuring instrumentation. The measurement system needed to be located in the laboratory while the operator adjusts and monitors the experiments from the safety of a control. As such, the digitiser system needed to be remotely operable.
The solution was the DN6.221-12 digitizerNETBOX system from Spectrum Instrumentation, which met all the necessary technical requirement. It offers 12 fully synchronous channels, each sampling at 1.25 GS/s (800 ps time resolution). The digitiserNETBOX units are LXI compliant instruments, enabling full remote control and data transfer over a GBit Ethernet connection.
Product Features
Provide a turnkey solution to multi-channel acquisition. Users can select the desired number of digitiser channels as well as fundamental specifications such as the sampling rate, resolution and on-board acquisition memory.
Units come with SBench 6-Pro software, which enables quick set-up.
Easy-to-use, graphical user interface allows multi-channel waveform display, data analysis and documentation. Acquired and analysed signals can be stored and exported to other devices, or other software programs, in a number of formats such as MATLAB, ASCII, binary and wave.
