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Super-Magnet Sheds Light on Semiconductors
Stony Stevenson writes "A group of researchers at Florida state have demonstrated a magnet design that could shed new light on nanoscience and semiconductor research. 'The Split Florida Helix magnet can direct and scatter laser light at a sample down the centre of the magnet and from four ports on the sides. Due to become fully operational in 2010, the device can generate fields above 25 tesla. The highest-field split magnet in the world currently attains 18 tesla ... The scientists will be able to expand the scope of their experimental approach, learning more about the intrinsic properties of materials by shining light on crystals from angles not previously available in such high magnetic fields.'"
Did I miss something in science class?
How is magnetism able to affect a beam of light?
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
In applications like MRI where you need not just high-intensity but also high-precision, you'll typically have a main superconducting coil and a couple of ancillary coils to iron out the kinks in the field pattern (eg. tesseral and shim coils).
Also depends on the frequency of operation; get high enough and the losses due to skin and proximity effects become unbearable (stuff like Litz wires and appropriate coil turns arrangement can help to mitigate this).
One more thing to worry apart with such high fields involved is whether the darned thing is going to fly apart when you hit the ON button. Lorentz forces are a bitch (I've looked at a group's work where they generate a 50T field using a single-turn micro-coil. They kinda cheat though - it's only a 40ns pulse and the single-turn coil literrally blows up after a couple of repetitions).