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APPENDIX A: Letter to the Scientific Community Dear - I have been asked to chair a committee of a panel reporting to the National Research Council investigating opportunities for research given some major new facilities to generate high magnetic fields. The impetus behind the study is the suspicion that a large portion of the scientific community in the United States would be very interested in doing research, given the availability (and accessibility) of a facility (or facilities) capable of producing 1) 750 kilogauss (c.w.) 2) "Static" pulse operation to approximately 1.5 megagauss, with con- stant fields for 10-100 milliseconds. 3) Pulse operation to 10 megagauss (non-destructive) for times in the microsecond range. 4) Very short (probably destructive) pulse operation to 100 megagauss (for nanoseconds?). using high magnetic fields. Clearly, a substantial national investment would be involved. In order to determine whether such an investment makes sense, our committee is investigating the scientific prospects should such facilities exist. I am writing you to ask if you could help us. If you had at your disposal fields of the sort described above, what experiments important to your field of research could you do? We would be interested in every category, but if a new area of opportunity would open up we'd like to know about it. Could you take some time and think of what you might be able to do, or what 94
Appendix A 95 others should do, given the availability of fields in the above range? I would appreciate hearing from you. It will be of great help to us. Thanks very much. Sincerely, Raymond Orbach