SCW industry news

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AMSC Realigns Operations to Accelerate Drive to Profitability
Westborough, MA, 29 March 2007: American Superconductor Corporation today announced the implementation of initiatives designed to transition the company's high temperature superconductor (HTS) products to the manufacturing stage and accelerate the company's drive to profitability.
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AMSC Successfully Completes Factory Acceptance Testing of 36.5 Megawatt High Temperature Superconductor Propulsion Motor for U.S. Navy
Philadelphia, PA, 28 March 2007: American Superconductor Corporation (NASDAQ: AMSC), a leading energy technologies company, and its strategic partner, Northrop Grumman (NYSE: NOC), announced today the successful completion of factory acceptance testing for the world's first 36.5 megawatt (49,000 horsepower) high temperature superconductor (HTS) ship propulsion motor at Northrop Grumman's facility at the Philadelphia Naval Business Center. This is the final milestone before the Navy takes possession of the motor.
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Nobel Laureate Paul C. Lauterbur, developer of MRI, dies at age 77
Champaign, IL, 27 March 2007: Paul C. Lauterbur, a University of Illinois professor of chemistry who was awarded a Nobel Prize in 2003 for his pioneering work in the development of magnetic resonance imaging, died this morning at his home in Urbana, Ill.
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The Future's Bright And Ferroelectric
Birmingham, UK, 26 March 2007: Researchers at the University of Birmingham’s School of Engineering are working towards achieving lower cost mobile phone calls with less interference in built-up areas or when phone traffic is very heavy using a novel class of materials called ferroelectrics.
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Powerful new MRI keeps Queensland scientists at forefront of brain science
Brisbane, Australia, 25 March 2007: Neuroscientists at the Queensland Brain Institute (QBI) are astounded at the detail available to them in brain images being generated by UQ's new Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) spectrometer.
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Happy Birthday Euratom!
Brussels, Belgium, 23 March 2007: Two treaties were signed in Rome on 25 March 1957, but at the celebrations marking the 50th birthday of the European Union this year, one is guaranteed to get far more attention than the other.
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New Varian/Accel Superconducting Cyclotron Enables Year-Round Proton Treatments at Leading European Research Institute
Villigen, Switzerland, 22 March 2007: Clinicians at the Paul Scherrer Institute in Switzerland have begun clinical treatments using the world's first commercial superconducting cyclotron for routine medical use, enabling high-precision proton therapy treatments for a range of cancer patients. The new cyclotron from Varian Medical Systems' Accel group is a key component of the equipment and is expected to facilitate more accurate treatments with fewer side effects.
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Scientific Surprise Greets Researchers at Higher Magnetic Fields
Tallahassee, FL, 21 March 2007: Research performed by a team at Florida State University’s National High Magnetic Field Laboratory suggests that the benefits of building higher-field superconducting magnets likely will far outweigh the costs of building them.
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AMSC Receives $8 Million Order from Sinovel for Additional 1.5 Megawatt Wind Turbine Electrical Systems
Westborough, MA, 21 March 2007: American Superconductor Corporation announced today its wholly owned subsidiary, Windtec(TM), has received a follow-on order for 150 additional wind energy electrical systems from Beijing-based Sinovel Wind Corporation Limited. The order, worth more than $8 million, is for the 1.5 megawatt (MW) wind energy systems Sinovel is manufacturing and selling in China. AMSC expects to ship all 150 electrical systems in its fiscal year ending March 2008.
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Subtlety of superconductivity revealed
Argonne, IL, 21 March 2007: Argonne National Laboratory scientists helped lead the superconducting revolution 20 years ago this month with their landmark solution of the structure of the most widely known high-temperature superconductor YBa2Cu3O7. Now, they have solved another tantalizing superconductivity mystery: how a subtle change in the structure of so-called electron-doped superconductors switches the phenomenon of superconductivity on and off.
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MRI Used to Steer Microdevices through Veins
Montreal, Canada, 16 March 2007: Some 40 years after the release of the classic science fiction movie Fantastic Voyage, researchers in the NanoRobotics Laboratory of École Polytechnique de Montréal's Department of Computer Engineering and Institute of Biomedical Engineering have achieved a major technological breakthrough in the field of medical robotics. They have succeeded for the first time in guiding, in vivo and via computer control, a microdevice inside an artery, at a speed of 10 centimetres a second.
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HTS-110 wins start-up exporter of the year
Lower Hutt, New Zealand, 15 March 2007: A company specializing in high temperature superconducting solutions won the ‘Start up Exporter of the Year’ category at the Gen-i New Zealand Incubators Awards in Auckland on Wednesday.
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Morse LLC Announces Intent to Develop Proton Therapy Center in South Florida Using Technology from Varian Medical Systems

Department of Energy Submits $23.6 Billion Spending Plan to Congress for FY’07
Washington, DC, 16 March 2007: U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today submitted the Department’s $23.598 billion spending plan to Congress for Fiscal Year (FY) 2007, a $45 million (0.2%) increase over the FY’07 request, as a result of the FY’07 Continuing Resolution. DOE’s spending plan includes $1.5 billion for the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
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Superconductor Technologies Inc. Announces Fourth Quarter and Year-End 2006 Results
Santa Barbara, CA, 15 March 2007: Superconductor Technologies Inc. (NASDAQ:SCON) ("STI"), a leading provider of high performance infrastructure products for wireless voice and data applications, today announced results for the quarter and twelve months ended December 31, 2006.
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AMSC Signs Multi-Million-Dollar Contract to Develop Higher Power Wind Energy Systems for Chinese Market
Westborough, MA, 13 March 2007: American Superconductor Corporation (NASDAQ: AMSC), a leading energy technologies company, announced today its wholly owned subsidiary, Windtec(TM), has signed a multi-million-dollar wind energy system joint development contract with Sinovel Wind Corporation Limited.
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Exclusive Co-operation Agreement for wind and small hydropower applications between Converteam Group SAS and Zenergy Power plc
London, UK, 12 March 2007: Converteam Group SAS, the international developer of systems and customised solutions for the conversion of electrical energy, and Zenergy Power plc (AIM:ZEN.L), the specialist manufacturer and developer of commercial applications for super- conductive materials, are pleased to announce that they have entered into a five-year exclusive co-operation agreement to jointly develop, manufacture, market and sell hightemperature superconductor (‚HTS‘) generators into the global wind and small hydropower markets. As part of this agreement, Zenergy becomes the exclusive supplier for HTS wires and coils for all Converteam‘s commercial activities in relation to wind power and small hydropower projects.
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EU-Directive: Potentially dangerous consequences for MRI

University of Twente puts cables for fusion reactor ITER to the test
Enschede, Netherlands, 8 March 2007: The Low Temperature Division of the University of Twente has signed a prestigious research contract: scientists of the group will start tests on the superconducting wires and cables for the thermonuclear ITER-project to be built in France. Cables with minimal losses and degradation are an important successfactor of nuclear fusion. A unique test site, in which the cables are subject to strong mechanical forces and extremely low temperatures, will prove their quality.
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Finland now a European front-runner in fusion technology
Helsinki, Finland, 7 March 2007: The FUSION technology programme reinforced Finnish skills in the field, especially in materials studies and in developing remote maintenance systems. This Tekes programme also improved the prospects for Finnish companies to participate in the vast ITER fusion power project.
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AMSC Strengthens Utility, Industrial and Wind Energy Product Offerings with Acquisition of Power Quality Systems, Inc.
Westborough, MA, 7 March 2007: American Superconductor Corporation announced today that it has signed a definitive merger agreement to acquire Power Quality Systems, Inc. (PQS) in an all-stock transaction valued at approximately $3.8 million, or approximately 1.3 times PQS sales for calendar year 2006. Based in Pennsylvania, PQS offers reactive compensation products known as Static VAR Compensators, or "SVCs," based on its proprietary thyristor switch technology.
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Unlocking the Secrets of High-Temperature Superconductors
Denver, CO, 7 March 2007: Although it was discovered more than 20 years ago, a particular type of high-temperature (Tc) superconductor -- material that conducts electricity with almost zero resistance -- is regaining the attention of scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory. Copper-oxide compounds, called cuprates, operate at temperatures warmer than traditional superconductors but still far below freezing. Understanding the mechanism for these superconductors may one day help scientists design superconductors able to function closer to room temperature for applications such as more-efficient power transmission.
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Superconductive Components, Inc. Reports Record Fourth Quarter 2006 and Full-Year Results
Columbus, OH, 7 March 2007: Superconductive Components, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: SCCI), dba SCI Engineered Materials, a manufacturer of high quality sputtering targets for select markets in the physical vapor deposition industry, today announced results for the three months and twelve months ended December 31, 2006. Fourth quarter 2006 versus fourth quarter 2005 highlights included:
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Probe to Detect Spread of Breast Cancer Co-developed by UH Scientist
Houston, TX, 5 March 2007: High-temperature superconductors hold the key to a handheld tool for surgeons that promises to be more accurate, cost-effective and safer than existing methods for staging and treating various cancers, including breast cancer.
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UW-Madison Engineer to Head US DOE Fusion Energy Office
Madison, WI, 1 March 2007: The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has named a University of Wisconsin-Madison engineering professor to lead its Office of Fusion Energy Science (OFES), located within the DOE Office of Science. The OFES oversees United States research in fusion energy, plasma physics and high-energy-density physics.
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Researchers Study Superconductivity, Magnetism in Novel Material
Fayetteville, AK, 1 March 2007: A University of Arkansas physics professor and his colleagues have created a nanoscale structure that contains both magnetic and superconducting properties at the same time, and they will be exploring the properties of this novel material this summer in Switzerland.
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