Investigation of Irradiation Effect on REBCO Coated Conductors for Future Radiation-Resistant Magnet Applications

Construction of a second target station of the Materials and Life Science Experimental Facility is one of the future plans of the Japan Proton Accelerator Research Complex. A superconducting magnet called a pion capture solenoid, which requires 100 MGy class high radiation resistance, will be installed for the muon beamline in the second target station. Therefore, we are researching and developing radiation-resistant magnets based on high temperature superconductors. As one of the research subjects, we have been investigating the effect of irradiation on rare-earth barium copper oxide (REBCO) conductors. Results of irradiation using the Co-60 gamma-ray facility indicated no significant degradation in superconductivity up to 27.4 MGy. However, decreases in the superconducting transition temperature and critical current were confirmed with a neutron irradiation fluence of 8.23 x 10(21) n/m(2).