APS News

May 2017 (Volume 26, Number 5)

2017 National High Magnetic Field Laboratory Open House

Every year since 1994, the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory in Tallahassee, Florida, hosts an open house, welcoming thousands of visitors to the facility. Scientists are treated like superstars, arriving in limousines and entering on a red carpet.

High Magnetic Field Lab

Laura Greene explaining to kids

Laura Greene giving autgraphs

Kid demo

Visitors to High Magnetic Field Lab

Kids watching milling machine

(Top L-R): The "MagLab" on Open House day; 2017 APS President and MagLab Chief Scientist Laura Greene signing autographs; photo-ops with the scientists are a huge hit.

(Bottom L-R): Laura Greene shows off the MagLab's largest bore magnet, which is big enough to take detailed MRI pictures of a rat. Kids were then able to see the amazing pictures of a beating rat heart and compare them to an MRI of a human heart; People line up well before doors open to see demos of vacuum chambers, sparking Tesla coils, and learn how magnets are magic; Youngsters love getting to see the equipment up close in action. Everything is open to the public with MagLab scientists and technicians explaining the complicated machinery, like this milling machine making a flange.

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Editor: David Voss
Staff Science Writer: Rachel Gaal
Contributing Correspondent: Alaina G. Levine
Publication Designer and Production: Nancy Bennett-Karasik