Research in super-high pulsed magnetic fields at the Megagauss Laboratory of the University of Tokyo

We present in this paper a brief review of the facilities of the Megagauss Laboratory (MGL) of the University of Tokyo, and an overview of the highlights of solid state physics in megagauss fields at MGL. The Megagauss Laboratory has a long history since the first prototype was established in 1972 in order to pursue new phenomena which may occur in the extreme high magnetic field limit. Since then, it has achieved successful development in the last three decades, and very recently in 1999, it was enlarged and renewed at the Kashiwa new campus. At the MGL, pulsed high magnetic fields are produced by three different techniques: electromagnetic flux compression (EMFC), the single-turn coil (STC) technique, and non-destructive long pulse magnets. The highest magnetic fields of 622 T has been obtained by EMFC. By the STC technique, very high fields exceeding 300 T have been obtained depending on the coil bore, in two systems with horizontal and vertical coil axes. These fields are applied in many different kinds of experiments, such as optical spectroscopy, cyclotron and electron spin resonance, magnetization and transport measurements. Non-destructive long pulse fields up to nearly 70 T from wire-wound coils are also available.