The lecture provides an introduction to superconductivity with an overview of its main features and of the theories developed to explain it. Superconducting materials and their properties will be described, especially those currently employed in energy applications (niobium-based superconductors, oxocuprates, MgB2) and promising recently discovered ones (pnictides). The wide range of superconducting energy applications (magnets, cables, fault current limiters, motors, transformers, etc.) will be covered as well as the advantages they offer with respect to their conventional counterparts.
The obligatory practical work is based on using numerical models to investigate the electromagnetic and thermal behavior of superconducting wires and applications such as cables and magnets.
 

Lectures

• Introduction
• Physics of superconductors
• Materials I
• Materials II (15.11 wires)
• Materials III (22.11 critical current + self-field)
• AC losses
• Applications I (magnets)
• Applications II (cables and fault current limiters)
• Applications III (Transformers, SMES, flywheels, levitating trains, induction heaters
• Applications IV (electrical machines)

EXERCISES
• Superconducting wires
• Critical current
• Self-field effects
• AC losses
• Magnet design
• Fault current limiters
• Power cables