Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised Aug 1, 2026

Rutherford cable

A Rutherford cable is a way of forming a superconducting electrical cable, often used to generate magnetic fields in particle accelerators. The superconducting strands are arranged as a many-stranded helix that has been flattened into a rectangular cable. It can typically only be applied to flexible superconductors that can be drawn into wire such as the niobium-based superconductors used in the Large Hadron Collider. The cable is named after the Rutherford Laboratory at Harwell Campus where the cable design was developed.

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Aug 1, 2026
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A Rutherford cable is a way of forming a superconducting electrical cable, often used to generate magnetic fields in particle accelerators.1 The superconducting strands are arranged as a many-stranded helix that has been flattened into a rectangular cable. It can typically only be applied to flexible superconductors that can be drawn into wire such as the niobium-based superconductors used in the Large Hadron Collider. The cable is named after the Rutherford Laboratory at Harwell Campus where the cable design was developed.2

References

References

  1. New Scientist. Reed Business Information. 1981-10-22. p. 242.
  2. Hoddeson, L.; Kolb, A.W.; Westfall, C. (2009). Fermilab: Physics, the Frontier, and Megascience. University of Chicago Press. p. 203. ISBN 978-0-226-34625-0. Retrieved September 5, 2017.
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