Explosively produced megagauss fields and recent solid state applications

Large magnetic fields may be generated by compression of an initial magnetic flux generated over a large area at relatively low magnetic field into a region of smaller area. Following a discussion of flux compression principles, the authors discuss megagauss field systems in use at Los Alamos where chemical explosives are used to compress the flux. Their use in some solid state experiments will be discussed briefly, including a planned set of experiments on YBCO to be done jointly with a Russian team, whose aim is to determine the low temperature, critical magnetic field of YBCO