We got up early and went to the lobby to have breakfast. The breakfast buffet is mostly carbs – donuts, cereals, muffins. They did have some bananas and juices along with the coffee. Michael made a killer bagel with peanut butter, jelly, and banana. I had donuts (jelly filled and regular). Very yummy. I’ll try to be better tomorrow.
We left the hotel around 9:00 AM and headed out to the FSU/National High Field Magnetic Laboratory. Our tour was scheduled for 10:00 AM with Kathleen Laufenberg. She’s a science writer and publicist and is very knowledgeable about all things magnetic. She showed us all around the different labs. It was fascinating. I went into this thinking I’d do it for Michael (because he loves all things magnetic), and I really enjoyed it. Beautiful building and fascinating things they are doing inside it. We both thank Felicia Hancock for making it possible.
We believe it is the best Magnetic Laboratory in the world.The lobby is full of beautiful and fun displays.
Kathleen Laufenberg, in charge of public relations, a science writer, editor of “flux” magazine, and tour guide extraordinaire.The walls of the halls are lined with informational posters that they produce at the lab.There are machine shops that produce most of the equipment that they all use in their work. The engineers design it, machinist produce it, and scientist play with it.The huge silver containers are called Dewars, after their inventor, James Dewar. We saw a lot of these. They hold liquid nitrogen and helium.A pit magnet. The yellow tape and lines on the floor means go no closer.I really liked the stool.Dewars.Sand Blaster? Not sure, looks like fun though.They have a table of old magnets for visitors, students, and teachers.Kathleen explains how they are made and work. The copper disks are of varying size and called Bitter plates. The huge amounts of electricity flows across the thin plates. The solid plate holds much more electricity that a round wire could, and therefore produce much greater magnetic fields, with greater Tesla. The plates are stacked with insulators between each plate.The sheet refers to a drawing of a world record setting magnet. If you every had an MRI, it was around 2 Tesla.Lots of posters.
The fate of all experimental magnets. The huge electrical inputs eventually burn up the device.
This will probably be a poster soon.Machinist at work.Big place.Raceways full of thick wires going everywhere in this place. They use 7% of Tallahassee’s total electric consumption.Control room, mostly concerned with cooling of the magnets.A mock up of the cooling system. Magnet on the left, cooling tower on the right. Bitter plates in the background.Too fun.Edie totally hogged Kathleen.Kathleen is explaining about the heart of the magnet where the strongest part of the field is and they can change the pressure and then shoot things in there with lasers. Things like graphene.This is a heavy duty emergency wash station. Very nice.This is a lab, the magnet is straight ahead. The scientist climb the stairs and insert the study object down into the center of the magnet. Dewars to the right.The first yellow line at the bottom means, “do not cross.” The second means, “Really?”Gloves.Probe for inserting test material into a magnet.Lots of cranes for moving magnets.Probes.Signs outside the lab tells of the magnet inside.
Lots of labels everywhere.A chance to learn or remember around every corner.
Bitter plates turned into an end table in a lounge.They add dyes to materials and then look at them with the electron microscope and produce these pictures.The pictures make sense given the material.
B Vitamin.Looks like what I imagined testosterone would look like.Super conducting material.
Cancer medicine.Buzz Aldrin signature.Dewar moving down the hall. Hope he doesn’t spill.Pretty tree out the rare window.MRI research here, most are 2 Tesla, and the NIH wants them to produce a 21 Tesla MRI for everyday use. Theory being that a 21 Tesla MRI will greatly improve the imaging generated.To Kathleen’s right is a sample of MRI with tape windings. The flat copper tape is effective in creating the field, the subject has to be in the center, where the greatest magnetic field is to get the best result.These horizontal magnets are used to create the fingerprint of oil wells. They run and keep a library of oil samples from all underwater oil wells and if you bring them oil in the water they can tell you what oil well it came from.
This experiment just got set up. Lasers and lenses and we don’t know what all.
The guy in the center is a Frenchman and the lead scientist. Everything learned here is freely available as a condition of use.Big Bang has filmed here and several movie parts have been filmed here, due to high ceilings and good lighting.Kathleen took us out from the second floor to the lobby and told us that all the materials are recycled. They gave some of the materials to local artists and they produced the art work in the building.
You can see the bitter plates and the rods that held them together.The lobby is attractive.Kathleen’s earrings are made of pieces of bitter plates. Her color coordination is great with her scarf, sweater and blouse.Bitter plate armadillo.The Spanish moss does so well in this humid warm climate.
After our tour (lasted about an hour and a half), we drove around and saw quite a bit of the FSU campus, en route to Costco. We found the Costco and got the items we needed and then drove to the Governor’s home and what we thought were the old and new Capitol buildings. We also saw a bit of the old downtown. Very lovely city with a nice blend of the old and new.
Nice grounds.
Interesting mobile in center of a traffic circle.
FSU campus is big with lots of impressive buildings.Edie’s eye for steeples.Quick Costco stop for some t-shirts for me.
Beautiful oak at the center of a traffic circle.Governor’s mansion. So many trees and so few views. Looked like my imaginings of a mansion in Florida.The Florida Capitol building is unique. Compact and city surrounded, it is a high rise complex missing the usual expansive grounds and park like setting.Old and new.
Not sure who they tied a yellow ribbon round the old oak tree for, but we wish them well and a safe return.
We got back to our hotel room at around 1:30 PM and started doing laundry ($2.00 per load). Not sure what/if we’ll do anything for dinner. That was our day. Hope yours was great!
