Enhancing the critical current properties of internal Mg diffusion-processed MgB2 wires by Mg addition

Abstract

The internal Mg diffusion (IMD) process produces a high-density MgB2 layer with high critical current properties, which makes it an attractive and promising method for fabricating MgB2 wires. We have obtained high critical current properties in our previous research. However, IMD-processed MgB2 wires can have unreacted B particles remain in the reacted layer due to the long Mg diffusion distance in the B layer during heat treatment. A reduction in the amount of unreacted B particles is expected to enhance the critical current properties. In this study, we attempted to disperse Mg powder in the B layer as an additive in order to decrease the Mg diffusion distance. We found that a 6 mol% Mg powder addition to a B layer drastically decreased the amount of unreacted B particles and enhanced the critical current density to twice the value for IMD-processed MgB2 wire with no Mg powder added. An analysis is presented that relates the microstructure to the critical current density.