Cooling achieved by rotating an anisotropic superconductor in a constant magnetic field: A new perspective

Abstract

A new type of rotary coolers based on the temperature change (ΔTrot) of an anisotropic superconductor when rotated in a constant magnetic field is proposed. We show that at low temperature the Sommerfeld coefficient γ(B,Θ) of a single crystalline superconductor, such as MgB2 and NbS2, sensitively depends on the applied magnetic field (B) and the orientation of the crystal axis (Θ), which is related to the electronic entropy (SE) and temperature (T) via the expression: SE=γT. A simple rotation of the crystal from one axis to one another in a constant magnetic field results in a change in γ and hence SE: ΔSE=ΔγT. A temperature change −ΔTrot ∼ 0.94 K from a bath temperature of 2.5 K is achieved by simply rotating the single crystal MgB2 by 90° with respect to the c-axis direction in a fixed field of 2 T. ΔTrot can be tuned by adjusting the strength of B within a wide magnetic field range. Our study paves the way for development of new materials and cryogenic refrigerators that are potentially more energy-efficient, simplified, and compact.