Milestones and Highlights in the Design and Use of Pulsed Magnets

The development and use of pulsed magnets is reviewed, tracing it back to the beginning 85 years ago: the original work of P. Kapitsa with his great optimism and cheerful acceptance of coil explosions, and the first use of a capacitor bank by T.F. Wall in the same period. Later milestones were the introduction of a new type of strong “micro-composite” wire by S. Foner in 1986, boosting the field level to 68 T, and subsequently the development of coils with optimised internal reinforcement by fibre composites at K.U. Leuven. Recent highlights are the establishment of very large dedicated pulsed field laboratories, notably at Los Alamos (NHMFL) with a flywheel-generator and at Dresden (HLD) with a 50 MJ capacitor bank, both in pursuit of developing a 100 T user magnet. Finally, destructive techniques beyond 100 T are reviewed.