2010, Yu Et Al.

i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f r e f r i g e r a t i o n 3 3 ( 2 0 1 0 ) 1 0 2 9 e1 0 6 0
available at www.sciencedirect.com
w w w . i i fi i r . o r g
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijrefrig
Review
A review of magnetic refrigerator and heat pump prototypes

built before the year 2010
Bingfeng Yu a,*, Min Liu a, Peter W. Egolf b, Andrej Kitanovski b

a
School of Energy and Power Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, 28, Xianning West Road, Xi’an 710049, China
b
University of Applied Sciences of Western Switzerland, Institute of Thermal Sciences, CH-1401 Yverdon-les-Bains, Switzerland
article info abstract
Article history: Magnetic refrigeration, heating and power conversion technologies are interesting alter-
Received 21 November 2009 natives to the conventional refrigeration, heat pumping and different conventional energy
Received in revised form conversion technologies. At present they all show a realistic potential to enter conven-
4 February 2010 tional markets, respectively to be applied in a few years. In this review paper, mainly
Accepted 4 April 2010 magnetic refrigeration and magnetic heating are addressed and from these two technol-
Available online 14 April 2010 ogies the main part is dedicated to magnetic refrigeration at room temperature. This article
covers the demand of giving a complete list and description of existing magnetic heating
Keywords: and cooling prototypes up to the year 2010. Forty-one machines, their components and
Magnetic refrigerator operation principles are presented in detail.
Heat pump ª 2010 Elsevier Ltd and IIR. All rights reserved.
Review
History
Prototypes de réfrigérateurs et de pompes à chaleur

magnétiques réalisés avant l’an 2010
Mots clés : Réfrigérateur magnétique ; Pompe à chaleur ; Synthèse ; Historique
1. Introduction potential to enter large existing markets (see e.g. magnetic

refrigeration (Kitanovski et al., 2008a), magnetic heating
1.1. Prospects of magnetic refrigeration (Egolf et al., 2006a) and magnetic energy conversion
(Kitanovski et al., 2008b)). Contrary to conventional vapor
Magnetic refrigeration, heating and energy conversion are compression/expansion systems, magnetic refrigeration
environmentally benign technologies with a realistic requires a solid magnetic material as working fluid (refrig-
erant). As these materials are neither gaseous nor in vapor
* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ86 29 8266 7953; fax: þ86 29 8266 7859.
E-mail address: bfyu@mail.xjtu.edu.cn (B. Yu).
0140-7007/$ e see front matter ª 2010 Elsevier Ltd and IIR. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ijrefrig.2010.04.002
1030 i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f r e f r i g e r a t i o n 3 3 ( 2 0 1 0 ) 1 0 2 9 e1 0 6 0
Fig. 1 e First room-temperature magnetic heat pump designed in 1976 by G. V. Brown (Brown, 1976; Gschneidner and
Pecharsky, 2008).
Fig. 2 e Different regenerative Brayton cycles are presented.

i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f r e f r i g e r a t i o n 3 3 ( 2 0 1 0 ) 1 0 2 9 e1 0 6 0 1031
Fig. 3 e The rotary magnetic refrigerator proposed by Steyert (1978a,b).
form, they do not escape and, therefore, show no leakage only the main idea is given. If a magnetocaloric material enters
and no Ozone Depletion Potential (ODP); also their Global a magnetic field it heats up and when it exits the field it cools
Warming Potential (GWP) is usually very small. For a defi- down again. If one replaces the compression in a conventional
nition of these broadly accepted measures consult refer- refrigerator or heat pump by the magnetization and the
ences as e.g. Egolf et al. (2002). Compared with conventional expansion by the demagnetization and does not change
refrigeration technologies, magnetic refrigeration has many anything with the heat absorption and rejection, then one has
excellent features, such as compact configuration, low a complete analogy between the two technologies. Notice that in
noise, high efficiency, high stability and longevity. The materials showing the inverse magnetocaloric effect, as e.g in
efficiency of magnetic refrigeration can reach 30%e60% of NieMneSn alloys, a material cools down when entering
Carnot cycle theoretically, whereas the efficiency of vapor a magnetic field region and warms up when leaving it (see e.g.
compression refrigeration is only 5%e10% of Carnot cycle Mischenko et al., 2006). Some of these materials also show,
(Yu et al., 2003). Thus many investigators have been beside a magnetic, a structural (martensitic) transition, and
focusing on the performance research of room temperature therefore a giant magnetocaloric effect. In this article this also
magnetic refrigeration since 1976 because of its great interesting phenomenon shall not be further discussed. One is
applicable prospect. confronted with a process, which involves magnetization, heat
rejection, demagnetization and heat absorption. If the utiliza-
1.2. Basic operation principles tion of the machine is at the lower end, where heat is absorbed,
then one has a magnetic refrigerator. On the other hand, if one
The operation principle of magnetic refrigerators and heat utilizes the heat rejected by the thermodynamic cycle at the
pumps, as well as of magnetic energy conversion machines, is higher temperature level, one operates the machine as
based on the magnetocaloric effect. In analogy also an electro a magnetic heat pump. To obtain continuous powers, magne-
caloric effect exists mostly on thin polymer films (e.g. Neese tocaloric material must enter and exit at least one magnetic field
et al., 2008), but at the present stage of material developments region periodically. To perform this, periodic linear or rotational
the magnetocaloric effect is more promising for the realization movements are demanded. Because magnetic forces are
of refrigerators and heat pumps. Because the general working present where magnetic field changes occur, and they also
principle of magnetic refrigerators and heat pumps has been depend on the magnetization of the material, one has main
described in detail in many articles (see e.g. Yu et al., 2003), here forces at the entrance and exit to the magnetic field. Because in
Fig. 4 e Kirol’s regenerative rotary magnetic heat pump containing a gadolinium disk stack is presented (Kirol and Dacus, 1987).
Fig. 5 e A magnetic refrigerator presented by the AMES Laboratory of IOWA State University in collaboration with
Astronautics Corporation of America announced in 1997 (Gschneidner and Pecharsky, 2007, 2008).
Fig. 6 e A rotary magnetic refrigerator with permanent magnets after Bohigas et al. (2000).
Fig. 7 e Active magnetic regenerator test apparatus at the University of Victoria in Canada (Rowe and Barclay, 2002; Tura, 2005).
the magnetic field region heat must be rejected, the tempera- thermodynamic process e absorbing heat leads to a driving
tures and therefore also the magnetizations are very different at force and the creation of mechanical energy.
these two locations. If the field strength is more or less identical, To be operated, magnetic refrigeration and magnetic
the directional derivative at the entrance is approximately equal heating require at least one magnetocaloric material,
to the one at the exit (just with an opposite sign), but one whereas magnetic energy conversion actually only requires
experiences different forces due to the different magnetizations a magnetisable material. However, if magnetocaloric
or a resulting torque in the rotational case. This force field material is applied in a magnetic power conversion
requires an energy input for the magnetization process, which is machine, the efficiency of the machine is higher than that
in analogy to the one demanded by a compressor to perform the of magnetic refrigeration or heating machine. This can be
compression of a refrigerant. On the other hand, in a magnetic immediately seen, if one considers the work of a thermo-
energy conversion machine e with a somehow inverse dynamic cycle in a temperature-specific entropy (Tes)
Fig. 8 e The “world’s first rotary magnetic refrigerator” with permanent magnets built by Zimm and his collaborators at the
Astronautics Corporation of America (Zimm et al., 2005, 2006).
Fig. 9 e Reciprocating magnetic refrigerator at Nanjing University (Lu et al., 2005).
diagram. In these thermodynamic presentations areas 1.3. Some articles, reports, books and review articles
correspond to the specific work, which has to be performed,
or to the specific cold energy or heat, respectively. The In 1997 Pecharsky and Gschneidner (1997a,b) published two
vertical displacement of the cold and hot temperature papers presenting the “giant” magnetocaloric effect in a GdSiGe
levels shows that higher temperature spans are obtained alloy. The discovery of the GMCE is a landmark in the develop-
when materials undergo an (adiabatic) temperature change. ment of room temperature magnetic refrigeration. In the new
Because in this article the last mentioned technology will millennium several other similar reviews followed. Six years
not be addressed anymore, for the interested reader in the later Yu et al. (2003) presented the development of magneto-
following some references are given: (Chilowsky, 1952; caloric materials in the temperature region around room
Elliott, 1959; Resler and Rosensweig, 1964, 1967; Vander temperature (0 Ce40 C), discussed magnetic refrigeration
Voort, 1969; Kirol and Mills, 1984a,b; Salomon, 1989; cycles and regenerators in magnetic refrigerators working at
Diebold et al., 2007; Palmy, 2007; Palmy and Egolf, 2007). room temperature and reviewed some typical magnetic
Fig. 10 e The rotary magnetic refrigerator designed, calculated and realized by the Tokyo Institute of Technology in
a collaboration with Chubu Electric Power Incorporation (Okamura et al., 2005).
Fig. 11 e The reciprocate prototype of a magnetic refrigerator at the Laboratoire d’ Electrotechnique Grenoble in France (Clot
et al., 2003; Allab et al., 2005).
refrigeration prototypes. Kitanovski and Egolf (2006) wrote temperature applications during the last six years. A compre-
a comprehensive treatment of the thermodynamics of magnetic hensive overview on materials, but also on applications is given
refrigeration processes based on a thermodynamic normaliza- in the textbook of Tishin and Spichkin (2003). Theoretical
tion of the magnetic energy, which was previously proposed by investigations on magneto-thermodynamic cycles were pub-
Landau and Lifshitz (1980). Moreover, Brück (2005), Gschneidner lished by Yang et al. (2005) and Yang and Lin (2006). On the basis
et al. (2005) and Phan and Yu (2007) performed comprehensive of statistical mechanics, He et al. (2008) investigated the irre-
reviews on recent developments in magnetocaloric materials. versible regenerative magnetic Brayton refrigeration cycle. Xia
Then Liu and Yu (2009a) described in detail the theoretical and et al. (2005, 2006) and Ye et al. (2007) presented models of irre-
experimental investigations on magnetic materials in room versible cycles of magnetic Ericsson refrigerator machines. Yu
Fig. 12 e Photography of the composite cylinder housing and the regenerator beds carrying two heat exchangers as it was
mounted at the University of Victoria in Canada (Richard et al., 2004; Rowe et al., 2005; Rowe and Tura, 2006).
Fig. 13 e 3-d structure form of the Cooltech magnetic refrigerator, some details in further pictures, a photography of the
assembly and the open Halbach type of magnet (Vasile and Müller, 2005, 2006).
et al. (2006) and Zhang et al. (2005a,b) proposed a new series of Gschneidner and Pecharsky (2007) and other related studies
parameterized expressions for room temperature magnetic (Tishin and Spichkin, 2003; Pecharsky and Gschneidner, 2006;
refrigeration and analyzed the relation between the heat and Wada, 2006; Tishin, 2007) accelerated the development of
the magnetic entropy in the regenerative magnetic Ericsson magnetic refrigerators operating in the room-temperature
refrigeration cycle operating at room temperature. Liu and Yu region (in the proximity of 20 C). The approximately expo-
(2010) presented a mathematical model for the irreversible nential growth of these activities after this milestone is shown
regenerative magnetic Brayton cycle and achieved corre- in a graphics in reference (Tegusi, 2003) and in actualized form
sponding analytical solutions for using paramagnetic material also in Fig. 38 in Chapt. 4.
and numerical results for using ferromagnetic material. They In 2004 Egolf and Kitanovski within the International
also developed a two-dimensional porous media model for Institute of Refrigeration (IIF/IIR) initiated a Working Party on
a reciprocating active magnetic regenerator of room tempera- Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature (see Egolf and
ture magnetic refrigeration (Liu and Yu, 2009b) Diebold, 2008) bringing together material scientists, scien-
tists working on magnetism, mechanical and structural
1.4. A very brief survey on magnetic refrigeration at engineering, fluid dynamics and thermodynamics scientists
room temperature to exchange knowledge and to coordinate their research
activities. Three conferences were organized by the working
After 1976 when G. V. Brown (1976, 1978) had built the first party leaders and local organizers. The conference series is
room temperature magnetic refrigerator, researchers all over named Thermag (Ther ¼ Thermodynamics and Mag ¼ Mag-
the world started to develop their own specific magnetic netism). Thermag I was held in 2005 in Montreux, Switzerland
refrigerator prototypes, among which outstanding and (Egolf et al., 2005), Thermag II in 2007 in Portoroz, Slovenia
representative ones are the machine of Steyert (1978a,b) and (Poredos and Sarlah, 2007) and Thermag III in 2009 in Des
Zimm et al. (1998). Moines, lowa, USA (Pecharsky and Gschneidner, 2009). The
Ten years ago the discovery of the giant magnetocaloric proceedings of these conferences give an overview of today’s
effect (GMCE) materials by Gschneidner et al. (2005) and development on magnetocaloric materials and magnetic
Fig. 14 e Schematic diagram of the flow process of the magnetic refrigeration system built at the Xi’an Jiaotong University
(Yu et al., 2005; Gao et al., 2006).
refrigeration close to and at room temperature. Contrary to Their field strengths were rather low so that no reasonable
these, this review summarizes the important developments of efficiencies were achieved.
magnetic refrigeration and heating in a more compressed A breakthrough was obtained by Brown (1976), who built
form and with a special focus only on the built prototypes and the first magnetic heat pump operating at room temperature
their specific operation characteristics. (see also in Fig. 1). His machine contained a superconducting
The published prototypes are grouped into two genera- magnet, which was cooled by liquid helium and was
tions. It is clear that this grouping is a little artificial, but it producing a magnetic field of 7 T. The machine was operating
makes the discussion of the entire broad range of machines between a heat source and heat sink with the temperatures
more over seeable. The characteristics of each generation are 273 K and 320 K, which corresponds to a temperature span of
explained at the beginning of each chapter devoted to a single 47 K. This maximum temperature difference was obtained
generation of magnetocaloric machines. after fifty cycles of operation, which is identical to the number
of magnetization/demagnetization cycles. The principle of
operation of Brown’s machine was based on the magnetic
2. First generation room temperature Stirling cycle (Organ, 2007) showing a reciprocating, respec-
magnetic heat pumps and refrigerators tively linear movement of the magnetocaloric material stack
through the magnetic field. The stack was filled with parallel
Magnetic refrigeration was first applied in low temperature gadolinium plates of 1 mm thickness. The working fluid in the
physics. The method usually operating with paramagnetic device was a 20% ethyl alcohol water mixture. Just after the
salts to obtain sub Kelvin temperatures is not a topic of this first presentation of Brown’s machine, it was reported (Brown,
review. The first generation of magnetic refrigerators oper- 1978) that the maximum temperature span was increased to
ating close-to room temperature show two main character- 80 K, namely from 248 to 328 K. However, the cooling power
istic features: 1) application of superconducting magnets and and the efficiency were low. The main reasons for this were
2) a low frequency of operation. There were only a few a small frequency of operation, irreversible heat transfer los-
prototypes built with simple permanent magnets assemblies. ses, and heat losses of the auxiliary superconducting system,
Fig. 15 e The reciprocate magnetic refrigerator at Hokkaido University in Japan (Kawanami et al., 2005; Kawanami, 2007).
heat gains and losses by conduction and convection and by Regeneration may effectively utilize the capacity to cool the
friction of the fluid flow through the flat plate heat lattice system, and thus increase the effective entropy change
exchangers. and temperature span (usually designed to span at least the
Before describing the work of Steyert (1978a,b), it is temperature interval between the heat source and the heat
necessary to explain the active magnetic refrigeration cycle. sink). A single stage device without regeneration may operate
Regenerators are well known in the engineering area. In the only in the limits of the adiabatic temperature change, as in
Stirling machine presented by (Organ, 2007), the operation of the example of the Brayton cycle shown in Fig. 2 (case A). A
a regenerator is only passive, which means it plays a role of regenerative magneto-thermodynamic cycle may be per-
storing and transferring heat between two different isochores formed in several ways. One solution is related to the fluid
(constant volume) processes. The passive regenerator does flow through the magnetocaloric material from the hot to the
not perform a thermodynamic cycle, because here the mate- cold heat exchanger and vice-versa (see Fig. 2, case B). Notice
rial in the regenerator is not the thermodynamic working the different connections of the heat exchangers with the
substance, as for example the working fluid in a conventional magnetocaloric wheel between case A and B! However, such
heat pump or refrigerator. flows may lead to unbalanced heat transfer (irreversible heat
In the magnetocaloric machines, the magnetocaloric transfer losses) in the case of a Brayton regenerative ther-
material is the working substance. It restores the heat rejected modynamic cycle. This is the case when the temperature
by the lattice in one stage of a cycle and returns it to it again in differences in the heat exchangers do not match the adiabatic
the next stage. This basically leads to regeneration. temperature change of the magnetocaloric material. An
Fig. 16 e Schematic diagram of the Yao magnetic refrigeration system (driving mechanism was not drawn): 1, permanent
magnets; 2, the beds; 3, the cold end heat exchanger; 4, the hot end heat exchanger; 5, the piston-cylinder displacer (Yao
et al., 2006).
Fig. 17 e A rotary magnetic refrigerator made by a Japanese team at the Tokyo Institute of Technology and Chubu Electrics; first
stage improvement stacked iron yoke (left) and the improved system (right) (Hirano et al., 2007; Okamura et al., 2005, 2007).
efficient and very sophisticated solution of a regenerative acting as a regenerator. Then the fluid is moving forth and
cycle is obtained, if one connects certain segments of the back through the magnetocaloric bed, which builds up
magnetocaloric material with others, as shown in Fig. 2 a temperature span between the two ends of the regenerator
(case C). bed. In this method the layered bed technique can be ideally
In the late seventies Steyert (1978a,b) introduced the prin- applied. Then the temperature at each space location is
ciple of the active magnetic regenerator (AMR). The device determinable because after some operation time a steady
presented in his patent is similar to the one invented by state temperature directional derivative is obtained. That
Brown. In the latter the working fluid connections are per- leads to the possibility to apply different materials at different
formed by separated liquid regenerators, which are actually locations in a manner that the material at each position is
passive regenerators. Contrary to Brown, Steyert e by intro- operating close to its Curie temperature, where the magne-
ducing the active magnetic regenerator (AMR) e proposed tocaloric effect is most pronounced. The application of the
a method where the magnetocaloric material has two func- layered bed method optimizes the process and increases
tions, namely performing the magnetocaloric effect and largely the efficiency of a machine. According to Fig. 3, the
Fig. 18 e The rotary magnetic air conditioner performed at the University Of Applied Sciences Of Western Switzerland. The
parts in red and blue denote the magnet poles (left); and photography of the machine is shown on the right-hand side (Egolf
et al., 2006aec; Sari et al., 2007).
Barclay and Steyert (1982), Barclay (1983), Barclay et al. (1984)

proposed numerous different modified designs. Maybe the most
interesting idea of them refers to the rotation of a magneto-
caloric material through a magnetic field including active
magnetic regeneration. Among these interesting ideas of that
period, another new solution which came up was the applica-
tion of ferrofluids operating as heat transfer fluids in magnetic
refrigerators, respectively heat pumps, in order to enhance the
heat transfer rate (see Barclay, 1982). At this stage of develop-
ment the pioneering work of Rosensweig (1985) e who already in
the 1960’s proposed to apply magnetocaloric fluids in heat-to-
energy conversion engines, must be mentioned. Such machines
apply a kind of reversed magnetic refrigeration cycle. Resler and
Rosensweig’s contributions are found in references (Resler and
Rosensweig, 1964, 1967). Four years ago the Swiss authors of
this article deposited two patents with magnetocaloric slurry
applications in magnetic heating and refrigeration (Kitanovski
et al., 2004; Egolf et al., 2006aec). However, because of a lack of
sufficient performing magnetic fluids, to our best knowledge,
up-to- present no such refrigerator, heat pump or energy
conversion machine has been built.
In the 1980’s by numerous scientists a large number of
different patents and publications on magnetic refrigerators
Fig. 19 e The reciprocating room temperature magnetic
were produced (Barclay, 1982, 1983; Barclay and Steyert, 1982;
refrigerator built at the Baotou Research Institute of Rare
Barclay et al., 1984; Hakuraku and Hisanao, 1986; Kirol and
Earth in China is presented here (Huang et al., 2006, 2007).
Dacus, 1987; Hakuraku and Hideaki, 1988; Kirol, 1988;
Peschka and Schneider, 1988). One of the most interesting
contributions is the work performed by Kirol, who in 1987
machine of Steyert undergoes a magnetic Brayton refrigera- announced (Kirol and Dacus, 1987) that a magnetic heat pump
tion cycle which is composed of two magnetic isofield (shown in Fig. 4) had been built. Unfortunately no photog-
processes and two adiabatic processes. In this machine the raphy or comprehensive data of this considerable work is
working fluid is flowing azimuthally through the porous available. The heat pump contained 125 coaxial disks with
matrix of the magnetocaloric ring. The inlets for the fluid are a total height of 25.4 mm produced of Gadolinium with an
specially shaped fluid conduits connected to the housing. The overall mass of 270 g. The magnetic field was produced by
magnetocaloric material e that presents the active magnetic a NdFeB permanent magnet assembly, which led to
regenerator e experiences in the circumferential direction a magnetic field intensity of 0.9 T in the gap. The reported
a temperature directional derivative different from zero. maximum temperature span is 11 K. The device performed
Notice that the temperature difference given by the temper- a kind of magnetic Ericsson cycle (this basic cycle is explained
ature derivative integrated over the fluid trajectory may lead in (Kitanovski and Egolf, 2006)), operating similar to the
to a much higher temperature difference than the adiabatic Steyert type machine (see Fig. 3 on the right-hand side). But
temperature difference occurring due to the magnetization or Kirol’s prototype shows an isothermal magnetization and
demagnetization process. This is important and advanta- demagnetization instead of adiabatic temperature changes.
geous, because in most refrigeration applications high To obtain isothermal magnetization and demagnetization the
temperature differences are required. heat transfer fluid must transport the right amount of heat
Fig. 20 e The magnetic refrigerator built by Astronautics Corporation of America (Zimm et al., 2007).
Fig. 21 e Rotary magnetic refrigerator with permanent magnets as presented by researchers of the University of Victoria in
Canada (Tura and Rowe, 2007).
into, respectively out of the material, namely in a manner that the discovery of the giant magnetocaloric effect by Pecharsky
the temperature just remains constant. and Gschneidner (1997a,b). This discovery led to a beginning
After the 1980’s, for a period of nearly ten years, not much of an approximately exponential increase of the number of
research work was done in designing magnetic refrigerators reviewed articles, which were published by material scientists
and heat pumps. Finally Green et al. (1990) built and tested on this topic.
a reciprocating magnetic refrigerator with an active regener- The number of inventions, designs and developments of
ator equipped with a layered bed. The regenerator contained machines also increased, but with a small delay. These
fillings with Gd and Tb, which are pure magnetocaloric investigations had been performed slower than the develop-
materials. A second passive Cu regenerator was placed in the ments of magnetocaloric materials and during a large number
circuit acting as cold temperature heat exchanger and a dis- of years. An important milestone at that time was a joint
placer was used to move the nitrogen gas (heat exchange project of the AMES Laboratory and the Astronautics Corpo-
fluid). A superconducting magnet produced a magnetic field ration of America. As result of a three-year’s project in 1997,
intensity of 7 T. The operating frequency was very low. The the two parties presented a successfully tested magnetic
device required seventy seconds to complete one refrigeration refrigerator that was operating with superconducting
cycle. It is reported that a maximum temperature span of 24 K magnets (see Fig. 5). According to Gschneidner and Pecharsky
(from 268 to 292 K) was obtained after some hundred cycles. (2007, 2008) the demonstration unit was operating for over
A remarkable breakthrough on the field of magnetic 5000 hours during a period of 18 month with no significant
refrigeration and heat pumping occurred in the year 1997 by problems and a demand of minor maintenance. This was
Fig. 22 e Buchelnikov et al.’s magnetic refrigerator: 1) the magnetic system (consists of the NdeFeeB magnet and an iron
yoke); 2) the Al-Mg radiator; 3) and 4) the motor devices of the heat transfer liquid pump and the rotary system reduction
gear device; 5) the rotary system (Buchelnikov et al., 2007).
Fig. 23 e The rotary magnetic refrigerator built and presented at the Sichuan University in China (Chen et al., 2007).
a significant improvement, because all earlier presented positioned at the side of the rotating wheel. In the first
magnetic refrigerators and heat pumps were operating only experiment these researchers obtained a magnetic field in the
for a few days. That device had a superconducting magnet machine of only 0.3 T. This field strength allowed a tempera-
leading to a magnetic field intensity of up to 5 T. The mag- ture span of 1.6 K to occur. Then in a second step the magnet
netocaloric material was gadolinium, which was mounted assembly was improved leading to an increased magnetic field
into the machine in form of packed beds of spheres with intensity of 0.9 T. The temperature difference in the occurring
a mean diameter between 0.15 and 0.3 mm. The maximum magnetic field was at its maximum 5 K. The magnetocaloric
cooling power was 600 W and the maximum COP showed 60% material was gadolinium in form of ribbons. The magneto-
of the Carnot efficiency. This ratio is also named exergy effi- caloric ribbons were positioned on two plastic disks, one with
ciency (Kitanovski et al., 2008a). The maximum temperature a diameter of 11 cm and a thickness of 8 mm and the other
span obtained was 38 K, namely between 274 K and 312 K with a diameter of 7 cm and a thickness of 8 mm. The two
(Zimm et al., 1998; Lawton et al., 1999; Gschneidner and ribbons were inserted into the machine, one after the other,
Pecharsky, 2007, 2008). for some testing runs. In both cases olive oil was filled into the
Bohigas et al. (2000) presented a refrigerator with perma- two cylinders, 100 cm3 into the first and 200 cm3 of oil into the
nent magnets. However, the article does not contain photos or second, respectively. The rotation frequency of the wheel was
experimental data, but the machine may be seen in a few very low, namely 0.06e0.8 Hz.
design drawings. Fig. 6 shows such drawings and some details In the same year Chubu Electrics (Hirano et al., 2002;
of the device. The refrigerator was operating with eight Okamura et al., 2005; Gschneidner and Pecharsky, 2007, 2008)
permanent magnets, forming two magnet assemblies, finished their building of a reciprocating magnetic refrigerator.
Fig. 24 e The reciprocate magnetic refrigerator of Risø National Laboratory in Denmark (Petersen et al., 2007).
Fig. 25 e A rotary magnetic refrigerator of the joint collaboration action between Cooltech Applications and INSA in France
(Müller et al., 2007).
Measuring a magnetic field of 4 T in the refrigerator, it was able occurring increase in the number of prototypes presented.
to reach a cooling power of 100 W and a maximum temperature The more technical criterion is given by some substantial
span of 21 K. At that time these were remarkable results and changes and improvements. Such alterations are, for
proved the possibility to build magnetocaloric machines example, a higher frequency of operation, the application of
operating with good operation characteristics adapted to stronger permanent magnets and of the rotary magnetic
possible practical applications. The magnetocaloric material refrigerator principle. Furthermore, different magnetocaloric
was in form of packed beds containing gadolinium spheres. materials were tailored to fit into the specific machines. The
Unfortunately e as in the case of numerous industrial projects e transition between the first and the second generation of
more extensive data about this device is not available. room temperature magnetic refrigeration and heat pump
In 2001 Rowe and Barclay (Rowe and Barclay, 2002; Tura, technologies is marked by the presentation of a special
2005) developed an active magnetic regenerator test appa- machine again by Astronautics Corporation of America in
ratus (see Fig. 7), which was operating as a reciprocating 2001 (Zimm et al., 2005, 2006; Gschneidner and Pecharsky,
device using a superconducting solenoid yielding at 2007, 2008). This machine was the world’s first “room
maximum a 2 T magnetic field. The maximum temperature temperature” magnetic refrigerator containing permanent
span obtained in this case was approximately 14 K occurring magnets.
in Gd, respectively in Gd1xTbx packed layered beds. The device, presented in Fig. 8, is based on a rotation of
a magnetocaloric disk through a static magnetic field, which is
produced by a Nd2Fe14B permanent magnet assembly with
3. Second generation room temperature steel. The assembly reached a magnetic field induction of 1.5 T
magnetic refrigerators and heat pumps in the gap. This machine contained a special rotating valve e
to avoid dead volumes e for the injection and distribution of
The second generation magnetic refrigerators and heat the heat transfer fluid. The working fluid in the refrigerator
pumps are defined by two criteria, the first being a sudden was water containing some inhibitors. The disk was made of
a changing number of beds over the time with packed mag-
netocaloric spheres having mean diameters from 0.25 to
0.5 mm. Three such beds were reported in (Zimm et al., 2005,
2006) and six are shown in (Zimm et al., 2003). By this
configuration the rotary wheel was divided into three sectors
and cycled in a steady state rotation through a low and a high
magnetic field region. The prototype was operating practically
noiseless and reliable over a range of frequencies between 0.5
and 4 Hz. The experimental results indicate that the refriger-
ation capacity decreased with the increase of temperature
span and a decrease of flow rate. The machine reached
a maximum refrigeration power of 50 W, which is sufficient
for a modern household refrigerator. The maximum temper-
ature span at no-load condition was 25 K. Moreover, the bed
filled with Gd achieved the largest cooling power when a small
temperature span occurred, while the bed containing a layer
Fig. 26 e Schematic drawing of the experimental apparatus of a GdEr alloy performed much better at the cold end of the
designed and built at the Hokkaido University in Japan bed when approaching, respectively passing by the material’s
(Nakamura et al., 2008). Curie temperature. In another application the porous bed
Fig. 27 e The AMR testing apparatus at the Hokkaido Industrial Research Institute in Japan (Hirano et al., 2009) is shown in
these pictures.
consisted of two layers of equal mass in succession, one et al., 2005) developed a very compact rotary magnetic
containing pure metal Gd and the other a GdEr alloy. refrigerator with interior permanent magnets (see Fig. 10).
Furthermore, some experiments were also performed with Unique and a new technique in this machine was that
other kinds of magnetocaloric materials, for example with a special arrangement of the magnets was rotating around
Lanthanum based alloys. a static magnetocaloric bed, distributing and varying the
In 2002 Blumenfeld et al. (2002) reported a design of magnetic flux density in the material probe. Permanent
a superconducting magnetic refrigerator without moving magnets made of neodymium were applied and yielded
parts. It contained static charging and discharging coils. The a magnetic field intensity of 0.77 T. The maximum magnetic
applied magnetic field in this prototype was 1.7 T. A torque to turn the magnets assemblies was 52 Nm. The rotary
maximum temperature span of 15 K was obtained and magnetic refrigerator contained four magnetocaloric beds and
reported in the case gadolinium powder was taken as each consisted of four kinds of Gd containing alloys with
refrigerant. a total mass of 1 kilogram. The layered bed technique was
In the same year a group of scientists at the Nanjing applied for the first time in this machine. In a steady state
University in China (Lu et al., 2005) built a magnetic refriger- operation mode each part in a bed with magnetocaloric
ator with the reciprocate principle containing two assemblies material has its well defined temperature - which is naturally
of permanent magnets (see Fig. 9). These Halbach type depending on the magnetic and thermodynamic properties.
magnets led to a magnetic field strength of 1.4 T in the gap By applying materials of different Curie temperatures at
between the magnet’s poles and the magnetocaloric material. different locations, a higher overall efficiency of the magne-
The magnetic field at this location is named external magnetic tocaloric effect can be achieved. The Curie temperatures of
field. Tests were carried out and the results published for these alloys were 4, 5, 7 and 10 C, respectively. As in
machine fillings with gadolinium consisting of grains of numerous other prototypes, water was also here acting as
0.2 mm diameter and a Gd5Si1.985Ge1.985Ga0.03 powder. Water heat transfer fluid. The experimental results confirmed that
was chosen as working fluid. The maximum temperature an optimal cycle time was chosen. The corresponding oper-
span achieved in this device was 23 K. ating frequency was rather low, namely approximately 0.4 Hz.
A year later the Tokyo Institute of Technology in collabo- The device obtained a maximum cooling power of 60 W and
ration with the Chubu Electric Power company (Okamura a no-load maximum temperature span of about 8 K.
Fig. 28 e The AMR system developed at the South China University of Technology (Zheng et al., 2009).
In 2003 researchers located in Grenoble in France (Clot mass of 230 g. These sheets were assembled to yield a parallel
et al., 2003; Allab et al., 2005) have built a reciprocating plate structure. The layer for the working fluid, which also in
magnetic refrigerator prototype (see Fig. 11). The permanent this machine was water, was of 0.1 mm thickness. Note that
magnet’s assembly of Halbach type provided a 0.8 T magnetic this distance is identical to the space between the parallel Gd
field. Gadolinium was applied in 1 mm sheets with a total plates. The device achieved a maximum cooling power of
Fig. 29 e The reciprocating prototype built at Cooltech Application in France (Bour et al., 2009).
Fig. 30 e The Prototype with electro magnets reported from Brazil (Coelho et al., 2009).
8.8 W and a highest temperature span of 4 K. The frequency of temperature of 301 K for an applied field of 1.5 T, a maximum
operation was rather low, for example, 0.5 Hz. no-load temperature span exceeding 50 K at a frequency of
In 2004 a team at the University of Victoria (Richard et al., 0.8 Hz and a rejection temperature of 301.5 K for an applied
2004; Rowe et al., 2005; Rowe and Tura, 2006) presented field of 2 T. The temperature at the interfaces through the
a reciprocating magnetic refrigerator and a very special design magnetocaloric regenerator bed increased with the rise of the
had been chosen (see Fig. 12). The magnets of the machine rejection temperature; the temperature span decreased fast
yielded good field strength for permanent magnets, namely with the increase of the heat load and obtained an approxi-
a magnetic field intensity of 2 T. The frequency of operation mate value of 22 K with an applied heat load of 10 W for all
was between 0.65 and 1 Hz, and the heat rejection tempera- tested operating points.
ture varied between 285 and 310 K. The system used two At the University of Quebec, Trois Riviers in Canada with
regenerator beds, whose lengths and diameters were the the aim of applying superconducting magnets, a reciprocating
same, namely 25 mm. Each regenerator contained approxi- magnetic refigerator was developed (Richard et al., 2004). In
mately 135 g of refrigerant consisting of three different mag- this magnetic refrigerator a magnetic field intensity of 2 T was
netocaloric materials (Gd, Gd0.74 Tb0.26, and Gd0.85Er0.15). obtained and Gd-R alloys were packed into beds performing
Helium gas was applied as heat transfer fluid, and the mean a layering. The maximum temperature span achieved was
pressure was fixed for 3, 6 and 9.5 bar. The experimental 14 K. At the Washington State University a similar recipro-
results indicate that the system achieved a peak no-load cating magnetic refrigerator was reported (Shir et al., 2005). It
temperature span of 37 K at a frequency of 0.65 Hz, a rejection was equipped by a Gd powder bed and the maximum
Fig. 31 e The device developed at the Grenoble Electrical Engineering Laboratory in France (Dupuis et al., 2009).
Fig. 32 e The reciprocating machine and the permanent magnet investigated at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and
Technology (Kim and Jeong, 2009).
temperature span was 5 K. This refrigerator had a permanent exchanger was composed of 15 pieces of micro structured
magnet’s assembly which provided a magnetic field strength square Gd plates with the same length and width of 45 mm by
of 2 T measured in the empty gap. means of cold UV polymerization, a spacing in the vertical
In the last three years an enourmous increase in the height of 0.2 mm in the coolant channels. The eight inserts
number of built prototypes was noticed. In 2005 the First gradually entered or left the magnetic field assemblies
International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room symmetrically and simultaneously by rotational motion. They
Temperature was held in Montreaux in Switzerland. In the were hydraulically connected in series, by four circuits with
same year also first results of the venture capital funded different stages of an active magnetic double regenerator
company Cooltech Applications in France were reported cycle, in order to make a better use of the magnetocaloric
(Vasile and Müller, 2005, 2006). Their rotary magnetic refrig- effect. The flow of fluid was controlled to improve the cooling
erator was composed of eight pieces of supporting discs capacity, which was obtained in the range of 100 W to 360 W.
positioned in synthetic material (see Fig. 13), which were In 2005 Yu et al. (2005) and Gao et al. (2006) at the Xi’an
mechanically stable and thermally isolated. These inserts Jiaotong University in China established an experimental
were interchangeable for the test of different magnetocaloric system of a room-temperature magnetic refrigerator with Gd
materials, different sensors for temperature, pressure, air and Gd5Si2Ge2 alloy operating in an AMR mode, as shown in
velocity, hydrometry and electrical power. Each insert was Fig. 14. The system consisted of a magnetic field, the flow and
packed with 165 g Gd. The rotating axes were made of stain- heat transfer sub system, the mechanically-driven sub system
less steel, where four pieces of NdFeB permanent magnets and the control and data-acquisition sub system. A water-
were rotating to provide a magnetic field of 1 T. However, the cooled electro magnet was used to generate a maximum
authors reported on a new type (open Halbach) magnetic magnetic field strength of 2.18 T. The AMR was designed as
assembly, which yielded a magnetic field between 1 to 2.4 T. a rectangular machine with the dimensions 140 76 36 mm.
To enhance the heat transfer rate the system applied micro The authors presented experimental investigations on the
heat exchangers resulting in structurally constraining performance of the system under various temperature ranges,
streams to flow through micro channels. The micro heat temperature spans, flow rates, and flow period conditions.
Fig. 33 e The prototype built at at Risø DTU in Denmark (Pryds et al., 2009).
Fig. 34 e The reciprocating device developed at UASWS/IGT in Switzerland (Sari et al., 2009).
The results indicate a maximum cooling power of 18.7 W regenerative porous beds were packed with a total mass of
when applying Gd particles with 0.3 mm mean diameter. The 1167.4 g Gd particles (mean diameter less than 1.4 mm). The
cooling power also decreased by increasing particle size. operating frequency of the system ranged from 0.4 to 1.0 Hz.
As shown in Fig. 15, another reciprocating magnetic They systematically studied the influence of the gas pressure,
refrigerator was built in 2005 at the Graduate School of Engi- the operating frequency and the temperature range on
neering of the Hokkaido University (Kawanami et al., 2005). performance of the AMR in both, the 11 cm stroke and 20 cm
Destilled water was chosen as heat transfer fluid. The stroke experiments, and obtained the lowest temperature of
maximum temperature span of approximately 10 K was 2.79 C at the cold end heat exchanger and a maximum span
obtained in experiments with packed beds (63% volume frac- of 42.3 K for no-load conditions. The experimental results had
tion) of Gadolinium. The frequency of operation was rather shown a maximum cooling power of 51.3 W with 18.2 K
low (e.g. w0.2 Hz), where the time required for the magneti- temperature span in 11 cm stroke, and a maximum cooling
zation or demagnetization process was 1 s and the time power of 25.2 W with a temperature span of 11.0 K in the
required for the fluid flow process varied between 0.5 and 20 cm stroke operation mode. In addition, the authors sug-
4.0 s. The magnetic field source was a permanent magnet with gested that mixed magnetic materials with different Curie
a magnetic field strength of 1 T. temperatures should be employed rather than a single
In 2006 Yao et al. (2006) at the Chinese Academy of Sciences magnetic material to obtain even larger temperature spans in
built an experimental rig, as shown in Fig. 16. Helium gas was these applications.
used as a heat transfer fluid, and two permanent magnets From 2003 to 2006 a Japanese research team at the Tokyo
with cylindrical holes (40 mm in diameter) were designed to Institute of Technology and Chubu Electrics (Hirano et al.,
supply a magnetic field of 1.5 T. Two reciprocating active 2007; Okamura et al., 2005, 2007) substantially improved the
Fig. 35 e The linear reciprocating device built at the University of Genoa in Italy (Tagliafico et al., 2009).
first rotary prototype presented in 2003. In a first step eddy- magnets. In the second step, the device was enlarged from the
current losses were reduced and the cooling power increased previous dimensions (h ¼ 270 mm, w ¼ 270 mm and
by 30% (e.g. to 110 W). In order to reduce the eddy currents, the d ¼ 430 mm) to new ones (h ¼ 410 mm, w ¼ 400 mm and
iron yoke was divided into 20 rings and stacked, with an d ¼ 390 mm). Furthermore, the pressure losses were substan-
electrical insulator sandwiched between the rings (see Fig. 17), tially decreased by changing the form of the magnetocaloric
leading to a reduction of the Joule heating and an increase of material in order to perform a circumferential directional flow
the temperature in the yoke caused by the rotation of the (previous axial flow) through ducts made of gadolinium. The
magnetic field intensity was increased from 0.77 T to 1.1 T
with a V-shaped salient pole type permanent magnet, and the
pipe diameter for fluid flow was also increased. The test
results indicate that the last improved system obtained
a maximum cooling power of 560 W with a COP of 1.8, and
a maximum COP of 2.4 with a cooling capacity of 244 W. Then
the research team confirmed the possibility of an AMR air
cooling system using air as coolant.
In 2006 a Swiss team at the University Of Applied Sciences
Of Western Switzerland presented at the world’s largest
industrial fair in Hannover a rotary magnetic demonstrator
for air conditioning with which they had won the first prize of
the Swiss Technology Award 2006 ( see Egolf et al., 2006aec;
Sari et al., 2007). In this machine the working fluid was air.
As shown in Fig. 18, the air flow inlet in this device was in axial
direction, whereas the flow proceeded to flow in radial direc-
tion through the magnetocaloric rotating ring. Inner fluid
connections enabled a regenerative process in order to
enhance the temperature span. Static permanent magnet
assemblies provided a magnetic field intensity of 0.8 T over
the half of the rotating coaxial ring, which consisted of
Fig. 36 e The improved prototype at University of Victoria gadolinium particle beds. The demonstrator was not opti-
in Canada (Tura and Rowe, 2009). mized and had a large mass of magnets, and the design
ek et al., 2009).

Fig. 37 e The rotary magnetic refrigerator at the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia (Tus
concept was considering application of a tiny honeycomb or had a specially shaped rotating permanent magnet assembly
wavy structure and not packed beds of magnetocaloric grains to provide a magnetic field intensity of 1.5 T. The magneto-
to achieve small pressure losses. Furthermore, the permanent caloric material gadolinium was positioned in 12 static beds
magnet’s assembly was not fully optimized in order to that consisted of numerous parallel plates (see Fig. 20), where
perform a high magnetic field. the average porosity of each bed was 52% (the total mass of
In 2006 a prototype of reciprocating room temperature beds was 916 g). Water with inhibitors was taken as heat
magnetic refrigerator was presented at the Baotou Research transfer fluid. The maximum temperature span was 12 K and
Institute of Rare Earth in China (Huang et al., 2006, 2007). The the maximum cooling power 220 W. First results did not
prototype consisted of a permanent magnet, an AMR bed, satisfy the expectations (numerical simulation results), which
a cold accumulator, a heat exchanger and a driving pump. were previously done. The pressure drops (up to 0.35 bar in
750 g gadolinium and 200 g LaFe10.97Co0.78Si1.05B0.2 were each bed) across the beds of parallel plates was twice the value
located in the machine as magnetic refrigerants and the obtained by numerical calculation. It was reported that the
diameters of the magnetocaloric material particles varied reason for this was a non ideal geometry (e.g. local variations
from 0.5 to 2 mm. An alkalescent water solution with a Ph of of the plate spacing’s). During experimentation the frequency
10 was applied as heat transfer fluid. As shown in Fig. 19, the of operation was at its maximum 120 rotations per minute.
magnetic structure had an air gap with a diameter of 34 mm This corresponds to 4 Hz, because the magnetization/
and a length of 200 mm and supplied a maximum magnetic demagnetization process occurred each in two magnetization
field intensity of 1.5 T. The system obtained a maximum no- and demagnetization zones during one single rotation of the
load temperature span of 18 C at a frequency of 0.18 Hz. The wheel.
cooling power was 20 W with a temperature span of 5 C. This At the University of Victoria in Canada Tura and Rowe
condition was obtained after an operation time of 45 min. (2007) constructed a magnetic refrigerator containing perma-
Moreover, the temperature span increased with the increase nent magnets for a testing of all sorts of magnetic refrigerants
of operation frequency. in different configurations. This machine is shown in Fig. 21. A
In 2007 Astronautics Corporation of America (Zimm et al., nested Halbach array of NbFeB permanent magnets was
2007) presented a new rotary magnetic refrigerator, which applied and led to a magnetic field of 0.1e1.47 T strength.
25
20
Patents per year 15
10
0
77
79
81
83
85
87
89
91
93
95
97
99
01
03
05
07
09
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
19
20
20
20
20
20
Year
Fig. 38 e Number of patents per year for magnetic refrigerators and magnetic heat pumps operating at or near the room
temperature (period: 1976e2009).
Water was the heat transfer fluid with a heat rejection the operation frequency 1e10 Hz. The predicted cooling power
temperature range of 253e311 K, and the operation frequency of the device was approximately 40 W.
was between 0 Hz and 4 Hz. The prototype showed cylindrical In 2007 a team at the School of Materials Science and
magnetocaloric regenerators (with a porosity of 57%) whose Engineering at the Sichuan University in Chengdu in China
volume, diameter and length were 20 cm3, 16 mm, and (Chen et al., 2007), designed, built and tested a permanent
110 mm, respectively. The void in the regenerator of the hot magnet based rotary magnetic refrigerator (see Fig. 23). The
heat exchanger and the cold heat exchanger was 0.83 cm3 and working wheel (with an outer diameter of 232 mm, an inner
0.4 cm3, and the parallel flow paths in the heat exchangers diameter of 168 mm and a height of 16 mm) was divided into
were optimized with a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) thirty-six sectors and each sector was packed with the
approach. The system designed to be flexible showed many working material in porous form, consisting of Gd particles
advantages, for example a simple design, easy accessibility to with a size of approximately 0.5 mm (total mass 1 kg). The
all the components and very low heat leakages. The magne- wheel was rotating with a frequency between 0.1 and 0.7 Hz.
tocaloric beds were alternatively magnetized/demagnetized The magnet assembly was based on the open Halbach array,
by a Halbach array. The inner magnet rotated relatively to an and it comprised permanent magnet material NdFeB and
external one. The researchers examined the influence of the FeCoV, which are soft magnetic materials. The height of the
heat rejection temperature and the operating frequency on air-gap was 20 mm and the density of the magnetic flux was
the temperature span when Gd flakes of 600 mm size were 1.5 T. The heat transfer fluid was as in many other machines
filled into the machine. The experimental results show that also water. The device achieved a maximum temperature
the temperature span of the system increased with the span of 11.5 K. The cooling power was 40 W when simulta-
increase of the operating frequency and the heat rejection neously the temperature span was 6.7 K and the frequency
temperature. This machine reached a maximum temperature approximately 0.15 Hz.
span of 13.2 K. Furthermore, the pressure loss and power In 2007 a reciprocating magnetic refrigerator was also built
consumption for different operation frequencies was inves- at the Risø National Laboratory in Denmark (Petersen et al.,
tigated. The pressure drop was rather large, namely between 2007). The prototype consisted of a ring-shaped (Halbach
0.15 bar at a frequency of 0.5 Hz and 1 bar at 3 Hz. type) magnet producing 1.2 T. The temperature could be
Buchelnikov et al. (2007) at the Chelyabinsk State Univer- varied by almost 9 C (Fig. 24 shows 8.7 C e this means that
sity presented a rotational type device with a small size of the inner part of a refrigerator being at room temperature
15 20 20 cm, as it is shown in Fig. 22. This apparatus con- (20 C) could be cooled down to almost 11 C). The magneto-
sisted of an electric part, a mechanical part, a magnetic caloric material (Gadolinium) was performed in parallel
system, a double circuit system and finally also a rotary part. plates. Because there is no experimental data present at the
Gd and NieMneGa based alloys were chosen to act as moment, we will rely on numerical data. The hot and cold
magnetic refrigerant and a permanent magnet to provide heat exchangers were made of copper, whereas the refrig-
a magnetic field of 1 T. The flow rate of the heat transfer fluid erant Gadolinium consisted of plates with a length of 5 cm and
was 0.6e1.5 l/min, the diameter of the rotary wheel 8 mm and a thickness of 1 mm. The cycle period of operation was
1052
Table 1 e Presentation of up-to-present built magnetic refrigerators and heat pumps with their main characteristics.
Name and location Date of Type and max. Max. cooling Max. Max. magnetic Magnetocaloric
announce-ment frequency (Hz) Power (W) DT (K) field strength (T) regenerator
material
1 Brown (1976, 1978) NASA, USA 1976 Reciprocating, Styrling/ / 47 (80) Supercond.7 1 mm Gd plates, 20% ethyl alcohol- water
2 Kirol and Dacus (1987) Idaho National 1987 Rotating type, Ericsson / 11 Permanent 0.9 T 125 Gd plates 76 mm, spacing 127 mm,
Engineering Laboratory, USA cycle 0.5 Hz water
3 Green et al. (1990) US NAVY, USA 1990 Reciprocating, 0.02 Hz / 24 Supercond.7 GdeTb metal ribbons, Nitrogen gas
4 Zimm et al. (1998) AMES Ast. Corp. A., USA 1997 Reciprocating 600 38 Supercond. 5 Gd spheres 0.15e0.3 mm
5 Bohigas et al. (2000) Mater. Science Institute, 2000 Rotary 0.8 Hz / 5 Permanent 0.9 Gd as ribbon on plastic disk, olive oil
Barcelona, Spain
6 Okamura et al. (2005) Tokyo Inst. Tech Chubu 2000 Reciprocating 100 21 Supercond. 4 Gd spheres
Electric Power, Japan
7 Rowe and Barclay (2002) Univ. Victoria, 2001 Reciprocating 2 14 Supercond 2 Gd & Gd1 xTbx layered beds of grains,
Victoria, Canada Helium
8 Zimm et al. (2003, 2005, 2006), Astronautics 2001 Rotary 4 Hz 50 25 Permanent 1.5 Gd, GdEr spheres, 0.25-0.5 mm, water
Corp. America, Madison, Wisconsin, USA with inhibitors
9 Blumenfeld et al. (2002) Los Alamos Natl. 2002 Charging- discharging 3 15 Supercond 1.7 Gd powder.
Lab. New Mexico, USA a coil, no moving parts
10 Lu et al. (2005) Sichuan Inst.Tech./Nanjing 2002 Reciprocating / 23 Permanent 1.4 Gd spheres, 0.2 mm. Gd5Si
University, China 1.985Ge1.985Ga0.03 powder
11 Okamura et al. (2005) Tok.Inst.Tech. Chubu 2003 Rotary (rotation of 60 8 Permanent 0.77 Gd1xDyx layered alloys, spheres 0.6 mm,
Electric Japan magnets) 0.4 Hz 1 kg, water
12 Clot et al. (2003) Lab. d’Electrontechnique 2003 Reciprocating 0.5 Hz 8.8 4 Permanent 0.8 Gd foils, 1 mm with gaps for water,
Grenoble, France 0.1 mm
13 Richard et al. (2004) Univ. Quebec, Trois 2004 Reciprocating 2 14 Supercond 2 Gd-R alloys layered beds of grains
Riveires, Canada
14 Rowe et al. (2005, 2006) Univ. Victoria Canada 2004 Reciprocating 1 Hz 10 50 Supercond 2 Gd-R layered alloys, Helium
15 Shir et al. (2005) George Washington 2005 Reciprocating / 5 Permanent 2 Gd powder
Univ., Ashburn, Virginia, USA
16 Okamura et al. (2007) Tokyo I. Tech., 2005 Rotary 110 10 Permanent 0.77 Gd alloys MnAsSb alloys, and Gd packed
Chubu Electric Power, Japan beds Water
17 Vasile and Müller (2005, 2006) INSA, Cooltech 2005 Rotary 360 14 Permanent 2.4 Gd plates, water
Applications Strasbourg, France
18 Yu et al. (2005) School of Energy and Power 2005 Reciprocating 18.7 3 Electro-magnet Gd 0.3 mm and Gd5Si2Ge2 particles, water
Engineering, Xi’an Jiatong University Xi’an, China (water cooled) 2.18
19 Kawanami et al. (2005) Graduate School of 2005 Reciprocating w0.2 Hz / 10 Permanent 1.0 Gd, 63% vol.- fraction, distilled water
Engineering, Hokkaido University, Japan
20 Yao et al. (2006) Technical Institute of Physics and 2006 Reciprocating 1 Hz 51 42 Permanent 1.5 Gd particles, helium
Chemistry, Beijing, China
21 Egolf et al. (2006aec) University of Applied Sc. 2006 Rotary - - Permanent 0.8 Gd particles, air
of Western Switzerland, Switzerland
22 Okamura et al. (2005, 2007) Tokyo Inst. 2006 Rotary 0.5 Hz 560 8 Permanent 1.1 Gd foils, water
Tech., Chubu Electric Power, Japan
23 Huang et al. (2006, 2007) Baotou Research 2006 Reciprocating 50 18 Permanent 1.5 Gd 750 g and LaFe10.97Co0.78Si1.05B0.2 200 g,
Institute of Rare Earth, China alkalescent water solution, Ph ¼ 10
24 Zimm et al. (2007) Astronautics Corp. 2007 Rotary 4 Hz 220 12 Permanent 1.5 Gd plates, water
America Madison, Wisconsin, USA
25 Tura and Rowe (2007) Univ. Victoria 2007 Rotary 4 Hz / 13.2 Permanent 1 47 Gd flakes, 0.6 mm, water
Victoria, Canada
26 Buchelnikov et al. (2007) Chelyabinsk 2007 Rotary 10 Hz 40 / Permanent 1 Gd, NiMnGa alloys
State University Russia
27 Petersen et al. (2007) Risø National 2007 Reciprocating <1 Hz / 8.7 Permanent 1.2 Gd plates, 1 mm
Laboratory, Denmark
28 Muller et al. (2007) INSA, Cooltech Applications 2007 Rotary magnet / / Permanent 1.3 T Gd, water
Strasbourg, France
29 Chen et al. (2007) School of Materials Science and 2007 Rotary magnet 0.7 Hz 40 11.5 Permanent 1.5 Gd particles, 0.5 mm, 1 kg, water
Engineering, Sichuan University Chengdu, China
30 Nakamura et al. (2008) Graduate School of 2008 Reciprocating / / Permanent 2.0 Gd particles, 33.4 g, water or air
Engineering, Hokkaido University in Japan
31 Hirano et al. (2009) Hokkaido Industrial Research 2009 Reciprocating / w2 Permanent 2.3 LaFeSi-type material, air
Institute, Japan
32 Zheng et al. (2009) South China University of 2009 Reciprocating / / Permanent 1.5 Gd
Technology, Chian
33 Bour et al. (2009), Cooltech Applications, France 2009 Reciprocating 1 Hz / 16.1 Permanent 1.1 Gd plates, 0.6 mm, water
34 Coelho et al. (2009) Universidade Estadual 2009 Rotary 0.5 Hz / 11 Electro-magn. 2.3 Gd pins, ethyl alcohol
de Campinas, Brazil
35 Dupuis et al. (2009) Grenoble Electrcal 2009 Reciprocating 1 Hz / 7.8 Permanent 0.8 Gd sheets, 1 mm
Engineering Laboratory, France
36 Kim and Jeong (2009) Korea Advanced Institute 2009 Reciprocating 1 Hz / 16 Permanent 1.58 Gd particles, 325 -500 mm, Helium
of Science and Technology, Korea
37 Pryds et al. (2009) Risø DTU, Denmark 2009 Reciprocating / / La0.67Ca0.33xSrxMnO3 plates, water and
ethanol mixture
38 Sari et al. (2009) IGT in University of Applied 2009 Reciprocating / / Permanent 2.0 LaFe11Co0.9Si1.1 and Gd, air
Sciences of Western Switzerland, Switzerland
39 Tagliafico et al. (2009) University of Genoa, Genoa, 2009 Reciprocating <0.2 Hz / / Permanent 1.5 Gd, 300 mm, water
Italy
40 Tura and Rowe (2009) University of Victoria, Victoria, 2009 Rotary 4 Hz 50 29 Permanent 1.4 Gd spheres, 300 mm
Canada
41 Tusek et al. (2009) University of Ljubljana, Slovenia 2009 Rotary 4 Hz / w7 Permanent 0.98 Gd plates, 0.3 mm, w600 g, distillated
water
1053
estimated by us to be lower than 1 Hz, based on the knowledge cycle, named AM2RC and that can be seen in Fig. 28. The
that it was a reciprocating type of magnetic refrigerator. The system consisted of a permanent magnet, an AMR bed,
research team at the Risø National Laboratory is now working a hydraulic circuit with pumps, the AM2RC kernel and
with Danfoss e one of the largest compressor manufacturers a control sub system. Applying a finite element method, the
in the world, to build a commercial prototype; the company scientists predicted a maximum magnetic field intensity of
claims to be ready for a first presentation by 2010. 1.5 T in the centre area of the gap. By optimizing the geometry
A rotary magnetic refrigerator prototype was developed in of the permanent magnet structure the weight was reduced by
a collaboration between the INSA Institute and the company about 40%. The rectangular AMR beds had the dimensions
Cooltech Applications in France (Müller et al., 2007). The 150 40 20 mm with a distance of 80 mm between them.
system was composed by a rotary magnet assembly and of The researchers in China also numerically investigated the
four static blocks of magnetocaloric material performed by influence of the temperatures in the hot and the cold heat
gadolinium. The maximum magnetic field was 1.3 T and exchangers on the refrigeration performance. However, up-
water was the working fluid. Unfortunately, there is not more to-present no experimental results were presented for these
information available. But from Fig. 25, one may easily verify theoretical and numerical predictions.
the manner how the magnetic field is produced in the mag- In France at Cooltech Applications Bour et al. (2009) built
netocaloric material. It is similar to the method applied in the a reciprocating prototype as it is shown in Fig. 29. The AMR
prototype built at the Tokyo Institute of Technology and bed was composed of 37 parallel plates of Gadolinium of
Chubu Electric Power (see Figs. 10 and 17). 0.6 mm thickness, showing a spacing of the heat transfer fluid
In 2009 the Third International Conference on Magnetic channels of 0.1 mm, respectively also 0.2 mm. The Halbach
Refrigeration at Room Temperature was held in Des Moines, arrays, which produced a magnetic field intensity between
lowa, in the USA. During the period 2008e2009 there were 0.8 T and 1.1 T in the air gap, consisted of an assembly of three
twelve prototypes of room temperature magnetic refrigera- sets of NdFeB magnets of 50 mm thickness. The French
tion reported worldwide. Some of them are only improved experts obtained experimentally the evolutions of the average
prototypes already described in the succeeding parts of this temperatures at the hot end and the cold end reservoirs for
article. Nakamura et al. (2008) at the Hokkaido University in different initial temperatures and operation frequencies. The
Japan built an experimental apparatus, which consisted of device led to a maximum temperature span of 16.1 K for the
a test section, a displacer, a permanent magnetic circuit, operation conditions with a fluid frequency of 0.3 Hz, a fluid
temperature measuring instruments and a control device (see velocity of 30 mm/s and an initial temperature of 19.6 C.
Fig. 26). The magnetic circuit is a closed circuit composed of Furthermore, the experimental results were compared with
two permanent magnets which generate a maximum the numerical results obtained with a one-dimensional model
magnetic flux density of 2.0 Tesla in the middle of the gap. to calculate transient heat transfer fluid behavior. The authors
Spherical gadolinium particles were packed into the test report that they will continue by testing the heat load with
section. The mass of gadolinium and the packing ratio are other magnetic materials than gadolinium.
33.4 g and 62.6%, respectively. The Japanese scientists deter- A prototype of magnetic refrigeration with a wheel type
mined experimentally and numerically the temperature AMR was built by Coelho et al. (2009) at the Universidade
profiles under several operation conditions for the Air-AMR Estadual de Campinas in Brazil. As shown in Fig. 30, the wheel
and the Water-AMR. Their results show that a larger flow had a diameter of 250 mm and a thickness of 20 mm, and it
volume and a higher flow rate are required to achieve the was made of PVC. Six cavities, in which gadolinium pins had
optimal operation conditions for the Air-AMR compared to the been filled, were connected to the axis of the wheel. Holes
Water-AMR. were performed for the heat transfer fluid ethyl alcohol to
In order to experimentally investigate the cooling charac- pass by. Every cavity (regenerator) contained a mass of 160 g of
teristics of an AMR using three types of spherical coated particles Gd. An electro magnet, which consumed a rather large elec-
of LaFeSi-type, Hirano et al. (2009) built an AMR testing appa- trical power, was built into the prototype of Yu and Gao (Yu
ratus, which is shown in Fig. 27. The components of this appa- et al., 2005; Gao et al., 2006). A large range of magnetic field
ratus are similar to those in Fig. 26. The packed bed had an inner intensities, namely between 0.24 Te2.30 T is reported. The
diameter of 12 mm and a length of 60 mm and the heat transfer prototype was mainly tested in an adiabatic mode. The results
fluid was air. The magnetic circuit of Halbach type shown in the showed that the prototype reached its stabilization level after
left corner of Fig. 27 was composed of two opposing permanent about twenty minutes and obtained a maximum temperature
magnets. The width, length and height were 204 mm, 160 mm span of 11 C at its optimal operation frequency (0.4 Hz to
and 186 mm and the air gap spacing of the magnetic circuit was 0.5 Hz).
20 mm. The total mass of the magnet circuit was measured to be In the same year a new AMR device was built to investigate
w83 kg and led to a maximum magnetic field intensity of 2.3 T. the influence of the demagnetization factor, the packing ratio,
The authors determined the transient temperature profiles and the system frequency, the flow rate and the synchronization
temperature differences of the AMR beds packed with four types of the magnetization. Furthermore, the influence of the fluid
of coated particles. The machine with a LaFeSi-type material phases on the performance of the AMR prototypes were
load achieved a temperature span of w2 K, which was smaller studied (Dupuis et al., 2009). As shown in Fig. 31, the Halbach
than that observed with gadolinium. cylinder supplied a magnetic field of 0.8 T. The 1 mm gadoli-
Zheng et al. (2009) at the South China University of Tech- nium sheets were stacked in a cylinder, whose external
nology built a room temperature magnetic refrigeration diameter and length were 30 mm and 50 mm, parallel to the
system, which showed an active magnetic double regenerator magnetic field. The packed bed was fixed and the Halbach
cylinder, which was moved in a reciprocating manner, was Switzerland (UASWS) developed a reciprocating apparatus for
driven by an electric actuator. The magnetization and the characterization of magnetocaloric materials under
demagnetization times were variable and the device could practical testing conditions. As shown in the right corner of
operate up to 1 Hz. The flow rates varied from less than 0.5 ml/ Fig. 34, the magnetocaloric material was placed and fixed in
s up to 23 ml/s. The investigators evaluated the flow rate, cycle a ‘material holder’ which was driven by a pneumatic linear
frequency, the fluid volume, and the temperature span. Their piston to be moved into and out of the magnetic field. The
results showed that a maximum temperature span of 7.8 C NdFeB permanent magnets supplied a maximum magnetic
was obtainable at a flow rate of 3 ml/s. Furthermore, the field strength of 2 T in the air gap, which had a cross section of
temperature span increased initially with increasing flow rate, 10 mm 50 mm and a length of 200 mm. Local pulsed air was
and then the temperature span decreased and finally slightly employed as heat transfer fluid. The authors presented the
increased again. preliminary measurements on temperature changes for
Kim and Jeong (2009) at the Korea Advanced Institute of LaFe11Co0.9Si1.1 and Gd in adiabatic and non-adiabatic condi-
Science and Technology developed a reciprocating magnetic tions. The results show that their developed device can be
refrigerator based on a permanent magnet’s field source. used to determine the Curie temperature and temperature
Gadolinium was the magnetic refrigerant and helium the heat change of magnetocaloric materials in room-temperature
transfer fluid (see Fig. 32). The operation frequency of the regions for a given magnetic field change. Moreover, the
device could reach 1 Hz. The diameter of the irregular shaped device can also obtain the magnetic forces applied on the
gadolinium varied from 325 to 500 mm. The magnetic field magnetocaloric material. Then the authors can select suitable
array was composed of 16 segments of permanent magnet magnetocaloric material (small applied force and increasing
and its external diameter, internal diameter and length were the system efficiency) for the AMR system.
76 mm, 16 mm and 47 mm, respectively. It supplied Tagliafico et al. (2009) at the University of Genoa in Italy is
a magnetic field intensity of 1.58 T at the center of the bore building a linear reciprocating magnetic refrigerator (see
and 1 T at the edges. Besides the tests of mass flow rate, Fig. 35). The device was composed of commercial components
pressure and magnetic field change in one cycle, the authors and specially designed components. The former components
also measured the averaged temperatures and the steady- were available on the technical market and the latter included
state temperature fluctuations of the regenerator in a cold two heat transfer exchangers, the magnetic field source and
flow mode. The results showed that the parabolic magnetic the shuttle. The heat transfer exchangers were made of
field distribution in the magnetic bore had a negative influ- stainless steel and brass with teflon seals to avoid any corro-
ence on the refrigeration performance and a maximum sion. Ten NdFeB magnets with a total weight of w5 kg were
temperature span of 16 C was obtained. Then the experi- surrounded by soft ferromagnetic material (Fe alloy) to obtain
mental results were compared with numerical results of a magnetic field intensity of 1.55 T in the air gap whose width,
a one-dimensional thermodynamic model. It was pointed out length and height were 10 cm, 50 cm and 13 cm, respectively.
that the numerical model should be improved by considering The total weight of the magnetic structure reached w30 kg.
a more accurate magnetic field change and better adapted The shuttle was made of plastic ABS and held two regenera-
heat transfer coefficients. tors. Each regenerator was composed of five parallel carbon
To illustrate the design and construction of the prototype pipes and three dummy tubes, filled with 300 mm gadolinium.
optimally, a test apparatus for room-temperature magnetic The total mass of gadolinium was 400 g in each regenerator
refrigeration was built at Risø DTU in Denmark (Pryds et al., and the void fraction of the packed bed reached 0.46%. The
2009). In fact, the prototype in Fig. 33 is similar to some frequency of the device was less than 0.2 Hz. Water acted as
degree to the one presented in Fig. 24. But the AMR of the heat transfer fluid. No experiment has been conducted yet,
former was filled with parallel plates made of magnetocaloric because the assembly of the refrigerator and the measure-
material La0.67Ca0.33xSrxMnO3 (0 x 0.33). The geometrical ment device are still under design and construction.
sizes of the regenerator housing could be changed so as to At Thermag II, Tura and Rowe (2007) described a perma-
explore a large range of regenerators. With such an nent magnet magnetic refrigerator (PMMR) (see Fig. 21) and
exchangeable regenerator housing, the performance of each obtained a maximum temperature span of 17 C and a cooling
designed housing could be compared consistently with that of capacity between 10 and 20 W (not yet published results). The
the existing test machine. The heat transfer fluid in this low performance is mainly a consequence of the flake-shaped
prototype employed water and an ethanol mixture. However, crushed Gd, which resulted in a high porosity of 62% and large
no experimental results of the system performance were pressure drop, and inadequate fluid technique to eliminate
presented. The Danish researchers name challenges for using completely air pockets in the system. Fig. 36 shows their
a large-sized AMR system and the methods of reducing heat improved system (Tura and Rowe, 2009), which is described in
leaks, optimal fluid management and magnetic field the Proceedings of the Thermag III conference. The scientists
construction, which they want to successfully handle till 2010. replaced in the regenerator the 43 g of Gd flakes by 55 g
For most magnetic refrigeration systems reported up to spheres with a diameter of 300 mm, whose length and volume
date, magnetocaloric materials were not magnetized and were 55 mm and 10.8 cm3, respectively. The authors suc-
demagnetized in adiabatic conditions. However, almost ceeded in reducing the amount of air trapped in the hydraulic
nobody pays attention to the measurement of the tempera- lines by a few methods as presented in detail in their reference
ture change of the magnetocaloric material in actual condi- (Tura and Rowe, 2009). They designed a new cold end heat
tions. Thus Sari et al. (2009) at the “Institute Génie Thermique exchanger, which was more effective and had a smaller dead
(IGT)” at the University of Applied Sciences of Western volume and a larger wetted area. Moreover, a new electric
heating element was installed, and it provided a cooling load structure. In most cases, water, or water solutions with
of up to 50 W. The experimental results showed that this inhibitors and freezing depressants were taken as working
modification increased the temperature span and cooling fluids (heat transfer fluid). The maximum frequency of oper-
power over all operating frequencies, which went up to 4 Hz. ation being 5 Hz was the highest value reached in built
The cooling power was more than three times larger than that prototypes. The maximum cooling power up to date obtained
obtained in previous tests, and the pressure drop had been was around 600 W. According to the application research by
halved because of the improved magnetic refrigerant geom- Kitanovski et al. (2008a), this cooling power can promise
etry. The prototype obtained a maximum no-load tempera- magnetic refrigeration employed effectively in the application
ture span of 29 C, which is the largest value obtained up-to- of household refrigerator, and magnetic refrigeration can
date in a permanent device. At the frequency of 1.4 Hz, the obtain greater COP and exergy efficiency values in other
system achieved a COP of 1.6 with a cooling power of 50 W and applications of central cooling systems, room air conditioners
a temperature span of 2 C. Their next research work will and supermarket refrigeration than vapor compression
focus on further optimization of the geometry, the Halbach refrigeration. It has clear evidence that in up-to-date proto-
array, gear motor, operating conditions and regenerator types reported, the pressure loss by the heat transfer fluid flow
composition by using multi-materials. is too significant to achieve high refrigeration performance.
An interesting prototype of a rotary magnetic refrigerator However, efficiency improvements of 20%e30% compared
(Tusek et al., 2009) has been built on the basis of permanent with those of currently available vapor compression-based
magnets at the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia. Their systems, are envisioned once technology development is
rotary magnetic refrigerator consisted of a rotating drum completed (Russek and Zimm, 2005). Therefore, magneto-
(cylinder) that rotated around an internally positioned caloric regenerators need to be optimized in order to achieve
stationary soft iron core and externally positioned stationary good and fast heat transfer rates and to minimize the pressure
permanent magnets. As shown in Fig. 37, the magnetic losses caused by the fluid friction. As a consequence a proper
structure was composed of four NdFeB permanent magnets selection of the working fluid, which also requires special
and low carbon 1010 steel used as a soft ferromagnetic design ideas in order to obtain large temperature spans, is
material, and two magnetic circuits existed to allow the rotary required. Let us assume that the thermal capacity of the
movement of the AMR’s. After optimization of the magnet applied fluid is large, as for example that of water. Then
structure geometry, a range of magnetic field intensities from special techniques are required to obtain large temperature
0.05 T to 0.98 T was obtained in the air gaps. There were 34 differences between the in- and out flowing heat transfer
AMR’s in the rotary drum and each AMR had the dimensions fluids. Most permanent magnets do not produce magnetic
10 mm 10 mm 50 mm. Gd plates, with a thickness of field strength above 1.5 T. Thus a large number of heat
0.3 mm, were filled in the AMR’s and the total mass of Gd was transfer processes (or longer regenerators) are required to
approximately 600 g. The prototype could operate up to obtain a desired larger temperature span. This is not only
a frequency of 4 Hz. This reference mainly focused on the related to the irreversible heat transfer entropy production,
experience in development of such a rotary magnetic refrig- but also to large friction losses caused by the fluid motion. One
eration prototype and no experimental results were reported. should also be aware that all these limiting factors may be
However, first predictions according to the researchers are overcome in the future, because a large number of possible
that approximately a 7 K temperature difference will be improvements still exist (see e.g. Kitanovski and Egolf, 2010).
achieved. In order to demonstrate the development of this tech-
nology, a search based on the database of the European Patent
Office was made to evaluate the number of prototype patents
4. Conclusion published each year. The patent search was performed by the
web-tool “espacenet” (see: http://ch.espacenet.com/intro/
In this article information on forty-one magnetic refrigerator/ introen.htm). The starting year for the analysis was 1976.
heat pump prototypes, ever built for a room-temperature This is the year when Brown presented the first magnetic
application, is given in detail. These prototypes may be refrigerator for room temperature application. The patent
distinguished by three main categories, e.g. reciprocating, search was restricted only to room temperature applications
rotary and static magnetic refrigerators/heat pumps. Their of magnetic refrigerators and magnetic heat pumps. It there-
operation characteristics are based whether on the magnetic fore did not comprise patents related to magnetocaloric
field source movement, on the magnetocaloric material materials or patents related to low temperature physics. Every
movement, or in special cases, on the on-off operation of patent was traced back to its origin. By this all the related
magnet coils. Magnets, which were mostly applied, include “family patents” are excluded in the presentation. Fig. 38
permanent magnets, superconducting magnets and electro shows the number of patents per year for the period
magnets, respectively. According to our best knowledge, 1976e2009 (notice also that the analysis was made in October
a magnetocaloric magnetic refrigerator or heat pump e 2009, which is not at the end of 2009). One has to be aware that
applying magnetocaloric fluids e has not been built yet, the actual number of patents on room temperature magnetic
despite some very interesting ideas exists. One also observes refrigerators and heat pumps is larger than the one presented
that the magnetocaloric materials in most magnetic refriger- in the figure, because certain protections are made only in
ators and heat pumps are performed by packed beds of grains. particular countries.
However, the latest prototypes show a switching toward A breakthrough was obtained by the discovery of the giant
parallel plates with the intention to perform a kind of periodic magnetocaloric effect by Gschneidner and Pecharsky (see
Fig. 38). Since then one may observe a close-to exponential Temperature, Des Moines, lowa, USA, 11e15, May.
growth of the number of patents per year. This is influenced International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 415e424.
by a higher activity in machine design and building of proto- Brown, G.V., 1976. Magnetic heat pumping near room
temperature. Journal of Applied Physics 47, 3673e3680.
types. According to insider knowledge, in the year 2010 the
Brown, G.V., 1978. Practical and efficient magnetic heat pump.
numbers will further increase. One also must notice that some NASA Tech. Brief 3, 190e191.
applications are not officially presented due to confidentiality Brück, E., 2005. Developments in magnetocaloric refrigeration,
requirements of certain companies. topical review. Institute of Physics Publishing. Journal of
Table 1 shows in comprehensive manner most important Physics D: Applied Physics 38, R381eR391.
information on all the prototypes which are presented in this Buchelnikov, V.D., Taskaev, S.V., Bychkov, I.V., Chernets, I.A.,
Denisovskiy, A.N., 2007. The Prototype of effective device for
review article. It has to be noted that certain data may be
magnetic refrigeration. In: Proceedings of the Second
available also elsewhere (e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room
Magnetic_refrigeration; http://www.technologyreview.com; Temperature, Portoroz, Slovenia, 11e13, April. International
http://www.chuden.co.jp/english/corporate/press2006/1107_1. Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 371e376.
html). More information on magnetic refrigeration thermo- Chen, Y.G., Tang, Y.B., Wang, B.M., Xue, Q.X., Tu, M.J., 2007. A
dynamics and materials may be found in following references permanent magnet rotary magnetic refrigerator. In:
(Lee et al., 2002; Iwasaki, 2003; Rowe and Barclay, 2003; Egolf Proceedings of the Second International Conference on
Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Portoroz,
and Kitanovski, 2005; Peksoy and Rowe, 2005)
Slovenia, 11e13, April. International Institute of Refrigeration,
Paris, pp. 309e315.
Chilowsky. C., 1952. Thermomagnetic generator and refrigerator.
US patent No. 2.619.603.
Acknowledgements Clot, P., Viallet, D., Allab, F., Kedous-Leboc, A., Fournier, J.M.,
Yonnet, J.P., 2003. A magnet-based device for active magnetic
regenerative refrigeration. IEEE Transactions on Magnetics 39,
The authors are grateful to the financial support from project
3349e3351.
of the National Natural Science Foundation of China
Coelho, A.A., Gama, S., Magnus, A., Carvalho, G., 2009. Prototype
(50876082) and project of the Changjiang Scholars and Inno- of a Gd-based rotaring magnetic refrigerator for work around
vative Research Team in University (IRT0746) and the good room temperature. In: Proceedings of the Third International
support of Swiss Federal Office of Energy (Thomas Kopp and Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature,
Roland Brüniger). Moreover, Michel Rochat, minister of Des Moines, lowa, USA, 11e15, May. International Institute of
education of the county of Vaud we thank for supporting our Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 381e386.
Diebold, M., Kitanovski, A., Vuarnoz, D., Egolf, P.W., 2007. Force,
activities building a magnetic heat pump prototype. Further-
torque and energy of machines with porous magnetisable
more, the Swiss authors are grateful to the Hes-so foundation wheels. In: Second Workshop on Magnetostrictive Materials
(M. Bonvin and Francois Gaille). and Magnetic Refrigeration, Vienna, Austria, 13e15, August,
pp. 15e16.
Dupuis, C., Vialle, A.J., Legait, U., Kedous-Lebouc, A.,
Ronchetto, D., 2009. New investigations in magnetic
references refrigeration device, AMR cycle and refrigerant bed
performance evaluation. In: Proceedings of the Third
International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room
Allab, F., Kedous-LeBouc, A., Yonnet, J.P., Fournier, J.M., 2005. A Temperature, Des Moines, lowa, USA, 11e15 May.
magnetic field source system for magnetic refrigeration. In: International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 437e442.
Proceedings of the First International Conference on Magnetic Egolf, P.W., Sari, O., Courret, G., 2002. Trends of refrigeration and
Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Montreux, Switzerland, air conditioning technology in Europe. In: Proceedings of the
27e30 September, International Institute of Refrigeration, Japanese Conference on Cold and Air Conditioning, Organized
Paris, pp. 309e318. by the Japanese Society of Refrigerating and Air Conditioning
Barclay, J.A., Steyert, W.A., 1982. Active magnetic regenerator, US Engineers (JSRAE), Okaya, 19e21 November Invited paper: 1e9.
patent No. 4332135. Egolf, P.W., Sari, O., Kitanovski, A., Gendre, F. (Eds.), 2005.
Barclay, J.A., 1982. Use of a ferrofluid as the heat-exchange fluid in Proceedings of the First International Conference on Magnetic
magnetic refrigerator. Journal of Applied Physics 53 (4), Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Montreux, Switzerland,
2887e2894. 27e30 September. International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris.
Barclay, J.A., 1983. Wheel-type magnetic refrigerator, US patent Egolf, P.W., Kitanovski, A., 2005. The Kelvin force and Liu force
No. 4408463. acting on a ferromagnetic material or fluid in a magnetic field
Barclay, J.A., Overton W.C., Stewart W.F., 1984. Magnetic and their relations to thermodynamic potentials. In:
refrigeration apparatus and method, US patent No. 4459811. Proceedings of the First International Conference on Magnetic
Blumenfeld, P.E., Prenger, F.C., Sternberg, A., Zimm, C.B., 2002. Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Montreux, Switzerland,
High temperature superconducting magnetic refrigeration. 27e30 September. International Institute of Refrigeration,
Advances in Cryogenic Engineering 47, 1019e1026. Paris, pp. 335e346.
Bohigas, X., Molins, E., Roig, A., Tejada, J., Zhang, X.X., 2000. Egolf, P.W., Gendre, F., Kitanovski, A., Sari, O., 2006a.
Room-temperature magnetic refrigerator using permanent Machbarkeitsstudie für magnetische Wärmepumpen:
magnets. IEEE Transactions on Magnetics 36 (3), 538e544. Anwendungen in der Schweiz. Final Report for the Swiss
Bour, S., Hamm, Jl., Michot, H., Muller, C., 2009. Experimental and Federal Office of Energy, project No. 100873/151017: 1e67 (in
numerical analysis of a reciprocating room temperature active German).
magnetic regenerator. In: Proceedings of the Third Egolf, P.W., Sari, O., Kitanovski, A., Gendre, F., Erbeau, N. 2006b.
International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Presentation of the Swiss Technology Award Demonstrator at
the Hannover industrial fair, 24-28 April, Germany (see for Kawanami, T., Chiba, K., Ikegawa, M., Sakurai, K., 2005.
example in: Bernhart, Ch., Swiss Technology Award: Kälte Optimization of magnetic refrigerator at room temperature.
mittels Magnet und Magnetisierung, Swiss Engineering 1-2, In: Proceedings and Presentation of First International
pp. 10e11 (in German)). Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration of Room Temperature,
Egolf, P.W., Kitanovski, A., Ata-Ceasar, D., Gendre, F., Sari, O., Montreux, Switzerland, 27e30 September. International
2006c. Magnetic refrigerator and heat pump using Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 275e283.
magnetocaloric fluid and process for magnetic heating and Kawanami, T., 2007. Heat transfer characteristics and cooling
cooling with such refrigerator or heat pump, WO 2006136041. performance of an active magnetic regenerator. In:
Egolf, P.W., Diebold, M. http://www.mcwp.ch/(October 2008). Proceedings and Presentation of the Second International
Elliott, J.F., 1959. Thermomagnetic generator. Journal of Applied Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration of Room Temperature,
Physics 30, 1774e1777. Portoroz, Slovenia, 11e13 April. International Institute of
Gao, Q., Yu, B.F., Wang, C.F., Zhang, B., Yang, D.X., Zhang, Y., Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 23e34.
2006. Experimental investigation on refrigeration performance Kim, Y., Jeong, S., 2009. Investigation on the room temperature
of a reciprocating active magnetic regenerator of room active magnetic regenerative refrigerator with permanent
temperature magnetic refrigeration. International Journal of magnetic array. Proceedings of the Third International
Refrigeration 29, 1274e1285. Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature,
Green, G., Chafe, J., Stevens, J., Humphrey, J., 1990. A Des Moines, lowa, USA, 11e15 May. International Institute of
gadoliniumeterbium active magnetic regenerator. Advances Refrigeration, Paris. 393e400.
in Cryogenic Engineering 35, 1165. Kitanovski, A., Egolf, P.W., Sari, O., 2004. Method and device for
Gschneidner Jr., K.A., Pecharsky, V.K., Tsokol, A.O., 2005. Recent the generation of cold and heat by magnetocalorific effect, WO
developments in magnetocaloric materials. Institute of 2004059222.
Physics Publishing. Reports on Progress in Physics 68, Kitanovski, A., Egolf, P.W., 2006. Thermodynamics of magnetic
1479e1539. refrigeration, Review article. International Journal of
Gschneidner Jr., K.A., Pecharsky, V.K., 2007. 30 Years of near room Refrigeration 29, 3e21.
temperature magnetic cooling. In: Paper and oral Kitanovski, A., Diebold, M., Vuarnoz, D., Gonin, C., Egolf, P.W.,
presentation, 2nd International Conference on Magnetic 2008a. Applications of magnetic refrigeration and its
Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Portoroz, Slovenia, 11e13, assessment. Final report for the Swiss Federal Office of Energy,
April. International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 9e21. project No. 101776/152191: 1e42.
Gschneidner Jr., K.A., Pecharsky, V.K., 2008. Thirty years of near room Kitanovski, A., Diebold, M., Vuarnoz, D., Gonin, C., Egolf, P.W.,
temperature magnetic cooling: where we are today and future 2008b. Applications of magnetic power production and its
prospects. International Journal of Refrigeration 31, 945e961. assessment. Final report for the Swiss Federal Office of Energy,
Hakuraku, Y., Hisanao, O., 1986. Rotary magnetic refrigerator, US project No. 101776/152190: 1e33.
patent No. 4625519. Kitanovski, A., Egolf, P.W., 2010. Innovative ideas for future
Hakuraku, Y., Hideaki, M., 1988. Magnetic refrigerator and research on magnetocaloric technologies. International
refrigeration method, US patent No. 4785636. Journal of Refrigeration 33 (3), 449e464.
He, J.Z., Wu, X., Deng, X.F., 2008. Performance characteristics of Kirol, L.D., Mills, J.I., 1984a. Thermomagnetic generator. In: Proceedings
an irreversible magnetic Brayton refrigeration cycle. of Intersociety Energy Conversion Engineering Conference, San
International Journal of Refrigeration 31, 138e144. Francisco, CA, USA, 19th of August, vol. 3, pp. 1361e1368.
Hirano, N., Nagaya, S., Takahashi, M., Kuriyama, T., Ito, K., Kirol, L.D., Mills, J.I., 1984b. Numerical analysis of
Nomura, S., 2002. Development of magnetic refrigerator for thermomagnetic generators. Journal of Applied Physics 56 (3),
room temperature application. Advance in Cryogenic 824e828.
Engineering 47, 1027e1034. Kirol, L.D., Dacus, M.W., 1987. Rotary recuperative magnetic heat
Hirano, N., Nagaya, S., Okamura, T., Kawanami, T., Wada, H., pump. In: Cryogenic Engineering Conference, St. Charles, IL,
2007. Development of room temperature magnetic USA, pp. 757e765.
refrigerator-overall plan. In: Proceedings of the Second Kirol, L.D., 1988. Rotary Magnetic Heat Pump, US patent No.
International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room 4727722.
Temperature, Portoroz, Slovenia, 11e13 April. International Landau, L.D., Lifshitz, E.M., 1980. Lehrbuch der theoretischen
Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 281e287. Physik VII: Elektrodynamik der Kontinua. Akademie-Verlag,
Hirano, S., Kawanami, T., Nakamura, K., Fumoto, K., Ikegawa, M., Berlin, pp. 151e155 (in German).
Hirasawa, S., 2009. A development of spherical-shaped Lawton, Jr., M.L., Zimm, C.B., Jastrab, A.G., 1999. Reciprocating
magnetocaloric materials using power coating method. In: active magnetic regenerator refrigeration apparatus, US
Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Patent No. 5934078.
Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Des Moines, Lee, S.J., Kenkel, J.M., Pecharsky, V.K., Jiles, D.C., 2002. Permanent
lowa, USA, 11e15 May. International Institute of Refrigeration, magnet array for the magnetic refrigerator. Journal of Applied
Paris, pp. 457e464. Physics 91 (10), 8894e8896.
Huang, J.H., Liu, J.R., Jin, P.Y., Yan, H.W., Qiu, J.F., Xu, L.Z., Liu, M., Yu, B.F., 2009a. Development of magnetocaloric materials
Zhang, J.X., 2006. Development of permanent magnetic in room temperature magnetic refrigeration application in
refrigerator at room temperature. Rare Metals 25 (6), 641e644. recent six years. Journal of Central South University of
Huang, J.H., Song, L., Jin, P.Y., Yan, H.W., Wang, Y., Tegus, O., Technology 16 (1), 0001e0012.
Zhang, J.X., 2007. Research on the magnetocaloric effect in Liu, M., Yu, B.F., 2009b. Porous media model for active magnetic
LaFe11.17XCo0.78Si1.05BX alloys. In: Proceedings of the Second regenerator of room temperature magnetic refrigeration and
International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room its numerical simulation. Journal of Xi’an Jiaotong University
Temperature, Portoroz, Slovenia, 11e13 April. International 43 (3), 31e35 (in Chinese).
Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 155e168. Liu, M., Yu, B.F., 2010. Theoretical and numerical investigations
Iwasaki, W., 2003. Magnetic refrigeration technology for an on refrigeration performance of irreversible regenerative
international clean energy network using hydrogen energy (WE- magnetic Brayton cycle. Journal of Xi’an Jiaotong University 44
NET). International Journal of Hydrogen Energy 28, 559e567. (1), 56e60 (in Chinese).
Lu, D.W., Xu, X.N., Wu, H.B., Jin, X., 2005. A permanent magnet Slovenia, 11e13 April. International Institute of
magneto-refrigerator study using Gd/GdeSiGe/GdeSiGeeGa Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 271e281.
alloys. In: Proceedings of First International Conference on Phan, M.-H., Yu, S. -Ch, 2007. Review of the magnetocaloric effect
Magnetic Refrigeration of Room Temperature, Montreux, in manganite materials. Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic
Switzerland, 27e30 September. International Institute of Materials 308, 325e340.
Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 291e296. Poredo s, A., Sarlah, A. (Eds.), 2007. Proceedings of the Second
Mischenko, A.S., Zhang, Q., Scott, J.F., Whatmore, R.W., International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room
Mathur, N.D., 2006. Giant electrocaloric effect in thin-film Temperature, Portoroz, Slovenia, 11e13, April. International
PbZr0.95Ti0.05 O3. Science 311 (5765), 1270e1271. Institute of Refrigeration, Paris.
Müller, C., Bour, L., Vasile, C., 2007. Study of the efficiency of Pryds, N., Bahl, C.R.H., Smith, A., 2009. Do simple magnetic
a magnetothermal system according to the permeability of the refrigeration test devices lead to more successful prototypes?.
magnetocaloric material around its Curie temperature. In: In: Proceedings of the Third International Conference on
Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Des Moines,
Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Portoroz, lowa, USA, 11e15 May. International Institute of Refrigeration,
Slovenia, 11e13 April. International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 363e370.
Paris, pp. 323e330. Resler Jr., E.L., Rosensweig, R.E., 1964. Magnetocaloric power.
Nakamura, K., Kawanami, T., Hirano, S., Ikegawa, M., Fumoto, K., AIAA Journal 2 (8), 1418e1422.
2008. Improvement of room temperature magnetic Resler Jr., E.L., Rosensweig, R.E., 1967. Regenerative
refrigeration using air as heat transfer fluid. In: Thermal thermomagnetic power. Journal of Engineering for Power 89,
Issues in Emerging Technologies, ThETA 2, Cairo, Egypt, 17e20 399e406.
December, pp. 381e390. Richard, M.A., Rowe, A.M., Chahine, R., 2004. Magnetic
Neese, B., Chu, B., Lu, S.-G., Wang, Y., Furman, E., Zhang, Q.M., refrigeration: single and multimaterial active magnetic
2008. Large electrocaloric effect in ferro- electic polymers near regenerator experiments. Journal of Applied Physics 95,
room temperature. Science 8(321) (5890), 811e813. 2146e2150.
Okamura, T., Yamada, K., Hirano, N., Nagay, N., 2005. In: Egolf, P.W., Rosensweig, R.E., 1985. Ferrohydrodynamics. Cambridge
Sari, O., Kitanovski, A., Gendre, F. (Eds.), Proceedings of the First University Press.
International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Rowe, A.M., Barclay, J.A., 2002. Design of an active magnetic
Temperature, Montreux, Switzerland, 27e30 September. regenerator test apparatus. Advances in Cryogenic
International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 319e324. Engineering 47 (8), 995e1002.
Okamura, T., Rachi, R., Hirano, N., Nagaya, S., 2007. Improvement Rowe, A.M., Barclay, J.A., 2003. Ideal magnetocaloric effect for
of 100 W class room temperature magnetic refrigerator. In: active magnetic regenerators. Journal of Applied Physics 93 (3),
Proceedings of the Second International Conference on 1672e1676.
Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Portoroz, Rowe, A., Dikeos, J., Tura, A., 2005. Experimental studies of near
Slovenia, 11e13 April. International Institute of Refrigeration, roometemperature magnetic refrigeration. In: Proceedings of
Paris, pp. 377e382. the First International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at
Organ, A.J., 2007. The Air Engine e Stirling Cycle Power for Room Temperature, Montreux, Switzerland, 27e30 September.
a Sustainable Future. CRC Press, Woodhead Publishing in International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 325e333.
Mechanical Engineering. Rowe, A., Tura, A., 2006. Experimental investigation of a three-
Palmy, C., 2007. A thermo-magnetic wheel. Europhysics News 38 material layered active magnetic regenerator. International
(3), 32e34. Journal of Refrigeration 29, 1286e1293.
Palmy, C., Egolf, P.W., 2007. Levitation and acceleration of Russek, S.L., Zimm, C., 2005. Potential for cost effective
a thermo-magnetic wheel. In: Proceedings of the Second magnetocaloric air conditioning systems. In: Proceedings of
International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration, Portoroz, the First International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration
Slovenia, 11e13 April. International Institute of Refrigeration, at Room Temperature, Montreux, Switzerland, 27e30
Paris, pp. 299e307. September. International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris.
Pecharsky, V.K., Gschneidner Jr., K.A., 1997a. Giant Salomon, D., 1989. Thermomagnetic mechanical heat engines.
magnetocaloric effect in Gd5(Si2Ge2). Physical Review Letters Journal of Applied Physics 65 (9), 3687e3693.
78 (23), 4494e4497. Sari, O., Hu, J., Alber, N., 2007. Magnetic refrigeration from
Pecharsky, V.K., Gschneidner, K.A., 1997b. Effect of alloying on Warburg to modern technology. In: Proceedings of the 5th
the giant magnetocaloric effect of Gd5(Si2Ge2). Journal of International Conference on Rare Earth Development and
Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 167 (3), 179e184. Application, Baotou, China, 7e11, August.
Pecharsky, V.K., Gschneidner Jr., K.A., 2006. Advanced Sari, O., Balli, M., Trottet, G., Bonhote, Ph., Egolf, P.W., Muller, C.,
magnetocaloric materials: what does future hold? Heitzler, J.C., Bour, S., 2009. Initial results of a test-bed
International Journal of Refrigeration 29, 1239e1249. magnetic refrigeration machine with practical running
Pecharsky, V.K., Gschneidner Jr., K.A. (Eds.), 2009. Proceedings of conditions. In: Proceedings of the Third International
the Third International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature,
at Room Temperature, Des Moines, lowa, USA, 11e15 May. Des Moines, lowa, USA, 11e15 May. International Institute of
International Institute of Refrigeration IIF/IIR, Paris. Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 371e379.
Peksoy, O., Rowe, A., 2005. Demagnetizing effects in active Shir, F., Bennet, L.H., DellaTorre, E., Mavriplis, C., Shull, R.D., 2005.
magnetic regenerators. Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Transient response in magnetocaloric regeneration. IEEE
Materials 288, 424e432. Transactions on Magnetics 41 (6), 2129e2133.
Peschka, W., Schneider, G., 1988. Apparatus for magnetocaloric Steyert, W.A., 1978a. Stirling-cycle rotating magnetic refrigerators
refrigeration, US patent No. 4727728. and heat engines for use near room temperature. Journal of
Petersen, T.F., Pryds, N., Smith, A., Bahl, C.R.H., 2007. A Applied Physics 49, 1216e1226.
numerical analysis of a reciprocating active magnetic Steyert, W.A., 1978b. High temperature refrigerator, US patent No.
regenerator with a parallel-plate regenerator geometry. In: 4107935.
Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Tagliafico, L.A., Scarpa, F., Tagliafico, G., Valsuani, F., Canepa, F.,
Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Portoroz, Cirafici, S., Napoletano, M., Belfortini, C., 2009. Design and
assembly of a linear reciprocating magnetic refrigerator. In: using permanent magnets. International Journal of
Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Refrigeration 29, 1267e1273.
Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Des Moines, Ye, X.M., Lin, G.X., Chen, J.C., Brück, E., 2007. Parametric
lowa, USA, 11e15 May. International Institute of Refrigeration, optimization of an irreversible magnetic Ericsson refrigerator
Paris, pp. 425e430. with finite heat reservoirs. Physica B 391, 350e356.
Tegusi, O., 2003. Novel Materials for Magnetic Refrigeration, PhD Yu, B.F., Gao, Q., Zhang, B., Meng, X.Z., Chen, Z., 2003. Review on
Thesis, University of Amsterdam. research of room temperature magnetic refrigeration.
Tishin, A.M., Spichkin, Y.I., 2003. The magnetocaloric effect and International Journal of Refrigeration 26, 1e15.
its applications. In: Series in Condensed Matter Physics. Yu, B.F., Gao, Q., Wang, C.F., Zhang, B., Yang, D.X., Zhang, Y.,
Institute of Physics, Bristol. 2005. Experimental investigation on refrigeration performance
Tishin, A.M., 2007. Magnetocaloric effect: current situation and of a reciprocating active magnetic regenerator of room
future trends. Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials temperature magnetic refrigeration. In: Egolf, P.W., et al. (Eds.),
316, 351e357. Proceedings of First International Conference on Magnetic
Tura, A., 2005. Active Magnetic regenerator experimental Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Montreux, Switzerland,
optimization, Master’s degree dissertation, University of 27e30 September. International Institute of Refrigeration,
Victoria, Canada. Paris, pp. 375e391.
Tura, A., Rowe, A., 2007. Design and testing of a permanent Yu, B.F., Zhang, Y., Gao, Q., Yang, D.X., 2006. Research on
magnet magnetic refrigerator. In: Proceedings of the Second performance of regenerative room temperature magnetic
International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room refrigeration cycle. International Journal of Refrigeration 29,
Temperature, Portoroz, Slovenia, 11e13 April. International 1349e1357.
Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 363e371. Zhang, Y., Yu, B.F., Gao, Q., Wang, C.F., 2005a. Research on
Tura, A., Rowe, A., 2009. Progress in the characterization and performance of regenerative room temperature magnetic
optimization of a permanent magnet magnetic refrigerator. refrigeration cycle through magnetocaloric parameter
In: Proceedings of the Third International Conference on deduced by Langevin theory. Journal of Xi’an Jiao Tong
Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Des Moines, University 35, 247e251 (in Chinese).
lowa, USA, 11e15 May. International Institute of Refrigeration, Zhang, Y., Yu, B.F., Gao, Q., Wang, C.F., 2005b. Influence of
Paris, pp. 387e392. temperature of heat reservoir on performance of regenerative
Tu
sek, J., Zupan, S., Sarlah, A., Prebil, I., Poredos, A., 2009. roometemperature magnetic Ericsson refrigeration cycle.
Development of a rotary magnetic refrigerator. In: Proceedings of Journal of Refrigeration 3, 33e37 (in Chinese).
the Third International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Zheng, Z.G., Yu, H.Y., Zhong, X.C., Zeng, D.C., Liu, Z.W., 2009.
Room Temperature, Des Moines, lowa, USA, 11e15 May. Design and performance study of the active magnetic
International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 409e414. refrigerator for room-temperature application. International
Vander Voort, E., 1969. Ideal magnetocaloric conversion. Applied Journal of Refrigeration 32, 78e86.
Science Research 20, 98e114. Zimm, C., Jastrab, A., Sternberg, A., Pecharsky, V.K.,
Vasile, C., Müller, C., 2005. A new system for a magnetocaloric Gschneidner Jr., K.A., Osborne, M., Anderson, I., 1998.
refrigerator. In: Egolf, P.W., et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of First Description and performance of a near-room temperature
International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room magnetic refrigerator. Advances in Cryogenic Engineering 43,
Temperature, Montreux, Switzerland, 27e30 September. 1759e1766.
International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 357e366. Zimm, C., Sternberg, A, Jastrab, A.G., Boeder, A.M., Lawton, L.M.,
Vasile, C., Müller, C., 2006. Innovative design of a magnetocaloric Chell, J.J., 2003. Rotating bed magnetic refrigeration apparatus,
system. International Journal of Refrigeration 29 (8), 1318e1326. US Patent No. 6526759.
Wada, H., 2006. Magnetocaloric effect and magnetic refrigerant Zimm, C., Boeder, A., Chell, J., Sternberg, A., Fujita, A., Fujieda, S.,
materials. Journal of Thermal Analysis and Calorimetry 33 (3), Fukamichi, K., 2005. Design and performance of a permanent
98e103. magnet rotary refrigerator. In: Proceedings of the First
Xia, Z.R., Ye, X.M., Lin, G.X., 2005. The influences of International Conference on Magnetic Refrigeration at Room
multieirreversibility’s on the performance of magnetic Temperature, Montreux, Switzerland, 27e30 September.
Ericsson refrigeration cycle. Refrigeration 3, 1e5 (in Chinese). International Institute of Refrigeration, Paris, pp. 367e376.
Xia, Z.R., Ye, X.M., Lin, G.X., Brück, E., 2006. Optimization of the Zimm, C., Boeder, A., Chell, J., Sternberg, A., Fujita, A., Fujieda, S.,
performance characteristics in an irreversible magnetic Fukamichi, K., 2006. Design and performance of a permanent-
Ericsson refrigeration cycle. Physica B 381, 246e255. magnet rotary refrigerator. International Journal of
Yang, Y.L., Chen, J.C., He, J.Z., Brück, E., 2005. Parametric Refrigeration 29 (8), 1302e1306.
optimum analysis of an irreversible regenerative magnetic Zimm, C., Auringer, J., Boeder, A., Chells, J., Russek, S.,
Brayton refrigeration cycle. Physica B 364, 33e42. Sternberg, A., 2007. Design and initial performance of
Yang, Y.L., Lin, B.H., 2006. Performance optimum analysis of a magnetic refrigerator with a rotating permanent magnet. In:
a magnetic Brayton refrigeration cycle. Low Temperature and Proceedings of the Second International Conference on
Specialty Gases 24, 22e26 (in Chinese). Magnetic Refrigeration at Room Temperature, Portoroz,
Yao, G.H., Gong, M.Q., Wu, J.F., 2006. Experimental study on the Slovenia, 11e13 April. International Institute of Refrigeration,
performance of a room temperature magnetic refrigerator Paris, pp. 341e347.

2010, Yu Et Al.

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

2010, Yu Et Al.

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f r e f r i g e r a t i o n 3 3 ( 2 0 1 0 ) 1 0 2 9 e1 0 6 0

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijrefrig

A review of magnetic refrigerator and heat pump prototypes

Bingfeng Yu a,*, Min Liu a, Peter W. Egolf b, Andrej Kitanovski b

article info abstract

Prototypes de réfrigérateurs et de pompes à chaleur

1. Introduction potential to enter large existing markets (see e.g. magnetic

Fig. 2 e Different regenerative Brayton cycles are presented.

Fig. 3 e The rotary magnetic refrigerator proposed by Steyert (1978a,b).

Fig. 9 e Reciprocating magnetic refrigerator at Nanjing University (Lu et al., 2005).

Barclay and Steyert (1982), Barclay (1983), Barclay et al. (1984)

ek et al., 2009).

Patents per year 15

You might also like

2010, Yu Et Al.

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

2010, Yu Et Al.

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

i n t e r n a t i o n a l j o u r n a l o f r e f r i g e r a t i o n 3 3 ( 2 0 1 0 ) 1 0 2 9 e1 0 6 0

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijrefrig

A review of magnetic refrigerator and heat pump prototypes

Bingfeng Yu a,*, Min Liu a, Peter W. Egolf b, Andrej Kitanovski b

article info abstract

Prototypes de réfrigérateurs et de pompes à chaleur

1. Introduction potential to enter large existing markets (see e.g. magnetic

Fig. 2 e Different regenerative Brayton cycles are presented.

Fig. 3 e The rotary magnetic refrigerator proposed by Steyert (1978a,b).

Fig. 9 e Reciprocating magnetic refrigerator at Nanjing University (Lu et al., 2005).

Barclay and Steyert (1982), Barclay (1983), Barclay et al. (1984)

ek et al., 2009).

Patents per year 15

You might also like

ek et al., 2009).