| NSF Org: |
DMR Division Of Materials Research |
| Recipient: |
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| Initial Amendment Date: | March 23, 2018 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | December 14, 2022 |
| Award Number: | 1644779 |
| Award Instrument: | Cooperative Agreement |
| Program Manager: |
Leonard Spinu
lspinu@nsf.gov (703)292-2665 DMR Division Of Materials Research MPS Directorate for Mathematical and Physical Sciences |
| Start Date: | January 1, 2018 |
| End Date: | December 31, 2023 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $175,112,912.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $185,515,728.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
FY 2019 = $40,618,000.00 FY 2020 = $34,585,000.00 FY 2021 = $26,133,942.00 FY 2022 = $38,910,000.00 |
| History of Investigator: |
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| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
874 TRADITIONS WAY TALLAHASSEE FL US 32306-0001 (850)644-5260 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
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| Primary Place of Performance: |
1800 East Paul Dirac Drive Tallahassee FL US 32310-3706 |
| Primary Place of
Performance Congressional District: |
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| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
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| Parent UEI: |
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| NSF Program(s): |
NHMFL, DMR SHORT TERM SUPPORT, CHEMISTRY NHMFL |
| Primary Program Source: |
01001718DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT 01001819DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT 01001920DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT 01002021DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT 01002122DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT 01002223DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT |
| Program Reference Code(s): |
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| Program Element Code(s): |
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| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.049 |
ABSTRACT
Non Technical
The Division of Materials Research with co-funding from the Division of Chemistry support this award to Florida State University for operation of the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (NHMFL). High magnetic fields are a powerful tool for scientific research, and have wide spread technological applications. The most popular applications include magnetic resonance imaging for medical diagnosis, high-speed magnetic levitation trains, and power generation. Scientists use high magnetic fields to explore new physical phenomena, develop materials for future generation computers, overcome energy challenges, and increase our understanding of the human brain and life in general. Home to many world-record magnet systems, the NHMFL is located at three sites: Florida State University, the University of Florida and the Los Alamos National Laboratory with seven unique facilities. More than 1,600 scientists from academia, government laboratories, and industry around the world come to the NHMFL sites each year, and use the powerful magnets and state-of-the-art instruments for research in materials science, condensed matter physics, chemistry, biology, as well as magnet technology and other instrumentation development. The Magnet Science and Technology division and the Advanced Superconductivity Center at NHMFL meet the laboratory's mission to develop new materials and to build new magnet systems to advance the frontiers of high magnetic field science. The mission of the NHMFL also includes the education and training of the next generation of scientists as well as to increase the scientific awareness of the broader scientific community. A large number of scientists, including 500 undergraduate and graduate students, 200 postdoctoral scholars, and 250 early-career scientists, use the NHMFL as their training ground. The NHMFL reaches tens of thousands of K-12 students, teachers, and the public through classroom lessons, summer and winter camps, internships, tours, and web-based interactive tutorials and activities. An open house event organized by the scientific and technical staff at the NHMFL brings more than 8,000 members of the general public to perform hands-on experiments each year.
Technical
The Division of Materials Research with co-funding from the Division of Chemistry support this award to Florida State University for operation of the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (NHMFL). The NHMFL includes seven user facilities: Steady State or DC Field, Electron Magnetic Resonance, Nuclear Magnetic Resonance, and Ion Cyclotron Resonance at Florida State University; Pulsed Field at Los Alamos National Laboratory; and High B/T and Advanced Magnetic Resonance Imaging and Spectroscopy at the University of Florida. User access is provided through a competitive proposal review process. Much of the research conducted at NHMFL can be classified in, but not limited to, the following 5 broad topics: (a) Quantum Materials, study of the broadly challenging manifestations of quantum phenomena in materials, including graphene and other atomically thin materials, topological matter, superconductors, and magnetic materials, in which magnetic fields change the electronic correlations and, hence, their properties; (b) Materials for Magnets, research and development of advanced materials with unprecedented combinations of properties including critical current density, conductivity, ductility, and strength that are critical for building next-generation high-field magnets; (c) Integrated Magnetic Resonance, analysis of complex problems in biological, chemical, and materials systems through leveraging the benefits of the state-of-the-art high-field electron and nuclear magnetic resonance methodologies; (d) Dark Chemical Matter, quantitative analysis using Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance (FT-ICR) mass spectroscopy of complex chemical systems such as petroleum, the cell metabolome, and battery materials, which are presently understood in general terms, but whose myriad individual chemical constituents remain unanalyzed; and (e) Structure, Function and Regulation, use of magnetic resonance spectroscopies to characterize the structural and functional properties of fundamental processes in biochemistry, biophysics, and biology, at molecular, supramolecular, cellular, and organ-based levels.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
The National High Magnetic Field Laboratory (National MagLab) remains the world’s largest and highest-powered magnet lab. A multi-disciplinary user facility, the National MagLab provided high magnetic fields to 9,240+ researchers between 2018 and 2022. Scientists used the National MagLab’s powerful magnets - instruments more than a million times stronger than Earth’s magnetic field - to investigate new materials, find energy solutions, protect the environment, understand diseases to improve health, and answer other important interdisciplinary research questions, generating more than 2,000 peer-reviewed publications.
Magnets Explore New Materials
Magnets help explore electronic properties of new materials, unlocking technologically-important behaviors for new products and devices. Researchers made important foundational discoveries on materials:
- Hydrogen-packed compound squeezed to ultra-high pressures superconducts close to room temperature.
- Uranium compound exhibited reentrant superconductivity in high magnetic fields.
- Explored graphene’s electrical conductivity and electron interaction and the first direct evidence of the nature of superconductivity in magic-angle twisted bilayer graphene.
- Method to bond together atomically-thin semiconductors that yields high-quality structures for new nanotechnologies.
- Behavior in cuprates suggests different current carrying method from conventional metals.
- Found promising thermoelectric properties in a class of 1-2-20s materials.
- Discovered evidence of a quantum spin liquid in ruthenium trichloride, findings with applications in quantum computing.
- Modified critical current of Nb3SN and boosted performance by 50%.
- Used far-infared magnetospectroscopy to probe coupled electronic and vibrational modes in a molecular magnet with quantum information applications.
Magnets Fuel Energy Discoveries
Researchers used high magnetic fields to fuel discoveries about existing energy sources and explore new ones:
- Work to understand how carbohydrates interact to form plant biomass which can be used for energy.
- Internal structure of corn revealed as different than previously thought, aiding in conversion into ethanol.
- A new method to stabilize the light emitted from a class of next-generation materials could yield cost-effective technology that can turn light into electricity.
- Showed that batteries built from inexpensive components can deliver three to four times the punch of batteries built with lithium-ion technology.
- New characterization method showed that crude oil corrosion is dependent on acid molecule structures, information that can help improve oil refining.
Magnets Protect the Environment
MagLab magnets analyze exceptionally complex mixtures with amazing precision and facilitate discoveries on the makeup of our world:
- Pinpointed pink pigments that are the oldest on record.
- Showed that sun and water exposure causes thousands of chemicals to leach from road asphalt binder into the environment.
- Discovered that older dissolved organics from deforested areas were more energy-rich and potentially more harmful to the planet.
- Found that sunlight can chemically transform consumer plastic bags into complex chemical mixtures that leach into the ocean.
- Analysis on peat wetland soils’ organic composition that has implications for climate models.
Magnets Understand Disease to Improve Health
Customized magnet systems - including a 21T MRI - allow scientists to study everything from whole, living animals to individual cells to tiny disease proteins, leading to exciting health-related discoveries:
- A link between migraines and sodium distribution through the brain that could yield future treatments.
- Possible pathway for metabolic waste removal from the brain found suggesting that waste clearance may be why we sleep.
- Polarized protons of hydrogen atoms in water, boosting its magnetic properties and making water that is more sensitive to MRI detection.
- Found new potential disease markers for brain tumors using chemical exchange saturation transfer.
- Contributed to creation of a Blood Proteoform Atlas that maps 30,000 unique proteoforms as they appear in 21 cell types found in human blood.
Magnet Technology
Home to more than a dozen world-record magnet systems, MagLab engineers work to advance magnet technology, pushing research magnets to new heights:
- A 2022 R&D 100 Award for the design and construction of the 32 tesla superconducting magnet.
- A mini no-insulation magnet test coil achieved 45.5 tesla, a world-record field that could inspire magnets for biomedical research, nuclear fusion reactors and other applications.
- Tested a CORC cable magnet that could be used in particle accelerators and compact fusion.
- Found that adding Hafnium can lead to 60% more electrical current carrying ability in a Nb3Sn wire.
- Showed how processing methods can influence Bi-2212 performance.
Education, Outreach & Broadening Participation
The National MagLab grows new generations of diverse scientists and from 2018 to 2022:
- Facilitated educational outreach to 7,400+ K-12 students.
- Offered long-term mentorship, camp or research program for 600 students.
- Engaged 29,000+ visitors at MagLab Open Houses.
- Contributed to 100 PhD and masters, theses.
- User Summer and Winter Theory School had 600+ attendees.
- Hosted users from 23 EPSCOR states with 5.5% of all MagLab users from Minority Serving Institutions.
Last Modified: 01/05/2024
Modified by: Gregory S Boebinger
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