The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 11, 1990
Filed:
Aug. 04, 1987
John E Williams, Wayland, MA (US);
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA (US);
Abstract
An electrical resistance device which comprises a resistance element and a superconducting gate element electrically connected in series therewith. The normal state resistance of the superconducting gate element is substantially greater than the resistance of the resistance element. A plurality of such devices can be used with the windings of a superconducting magnet, for example, to protect the windings thereof if the temperature of a particular winding region rises rapidly (the winding region quenches) due to operational instabilities, for example. At a quench the voltage at the winding region being quenched is applied to all the other devices at the other windings to generate heat at such devices in response to a relatively small voltage increase at the initially quenched region. Each of the other winding regions is thereby quenched and the gate elements thereof are triggered into their normal resistive states so that the current in the devices is reduced to a safe level.