| Abstract: | Utilization of novel materials, particularly high-Tc (critical temperature) superconductors, is essential to pursue the United Nations' Sustainable Goals, as well as to meet the increasing worldwide demand for clean and carbon-free electric power technologies. Superconduct-ing magnets are beneficial in several real-life applications including transportation, energy production, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and drug delivery systems. To achieve high performance, one must develop uniform, large-grain, infiltration-growth (IG) processed bulk YBa2Cu3Oy (Y-123) super-magnets. In this study, we report the magnetic and microstructural properties of a large-grain, top-seeded, IG-pro-cessed Y-123 pellet, which is 20 mm in diameter and 6 mm in height; the pellet is produced utilizing liquid Yb-123+Ba3Cu5O8 as the liquid source. All the samples cut from the top of the bulk exhibit a sharp superconducting transition (approximately 1 K wide) with the onset Tc of approximately 90 K. However, in the samples cut from the bottom surface, the onset Tc values slightly decreased to between 88 and 90 K, al-though still exhibiting a sharp superconducting transition. The top and bottom samples exhibited the highest remnant value of Jc (critical cur-rent density) at 77 K H//c-axis of 50 and 55 kA/cm2, respectively. The remnant Jc and irreversibility field values significantly fluctuated, being fairly low in some bottom samples. Scanning electron microscopy identified nanometer size Y-211 (Y2BaCuO5) secondary-phase particles dis-persed in the Y-123 matrix. Energy-dispersive spectroscopy clarified that the decreased both Tc and Jc for the bottom samples were attributed to liquid phase dispersion within the Y-123 phase. |
