Subatomic particles can be steered toward a target by being made to “crab,” or move sideways, in a crab cavity, which enlists oscillating magnetic fields to pull and guide each particle out of line using a slightly different force. But magnetic fields interacting with superconducting cavity walls can generate heat &ndash enough to quench the superconductivity and even damage the cavity. Tech-X Corp. uses computational modeling and visualization to anticipate and avoid field-generated hot spots.

Tech-X Corp.: J. Cary and T. Austin