A 3D printed superconducting aluminium microwave cavity

Journal Article · Mon Jul 18 00:00:00 EDT 2016 · Applied Physics Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4958684· OSTI ID:22594471

Creedon, Daniel L. ^[1]; Goryachev, Maxim; Kostylev, Nikita; Sercombe, Timothy B. ^[2]

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1. School of Physics, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria 3010 (Australia)
2. School of Mechanical and Chemical Engineering, University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Highway, Crawley 6009 (Australia)

3D printing of plastics, ceramics, and metals has existed for several decades and has revolutionized many areas of manufacturing and science. Printing of metals, in particular, has found a number of applications in fields as diverse as customized medical implants, jet engine bearings, and rapid prototyping in the automotive industry. Although many techniques are used for 3D printing metals, they commonly rely on computer controlled melting or sintering of a metal alloy powder using a laser or electron beam. The mechanical properties of parts produced in such a way have been well studied, but little attention has been paid to their electrical properties. Here we show that a microwave cavity (resonant frequencies 9.9 and 11.2 GHz) 3D printed using an Al-12Si alloy exhibits superconductivity when cooled below the critical temperature of aluminium (1.2 K), with a performance comparable with the common 6061 alloy of aluminium. Superconducting cavities find application in numerous areas of physics, from particle accelerators to cavity quantum electrodynamics experiments. The result is achieved even with a very large concentration of non-superconducting silicon in the alloy of 12.18%, compared with Al-6061, which has between 0.4% and 0.8%. Our results may pave the way for the possibility of 3D printing superconducting cavity configurations that are otherwise impossible to machine.

• OSTI ID: 22594471
• Journal Information: Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 109, Issue 3; Other Information: (c) 2016 Author(s); Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0003-6951
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS
SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY
ALUMINIUM
ALUMINIUM ALLOYS
AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY
CERAMICS
COMPARATIVE EVALUATIONS
CONCENTRATION RATIO
CRITICAL TEMPERATURE
ELECTRON BEAMS
ELECTRONS
MECHANICAL PROPERTIES
MELTING
MICROWAVE RADIATION
PLASTICS
POWDERS
QUANTUM ELECTRODYNAMICS
SILICON
SINTERING
SUPERCONDUCTING CAVITY RESONATORS
SUPERCONDUCTIVITY
THREE-DIMENSIONAL CALCULATIONS