Enhanced stability by field cooling in superconducting levitation with translational symmetry.

The force and stability of a levitating system consisting of an infinitely long superconductor and different arrangements of infinitely long parallel permanent magnets are theoretically analyzed for two different cooling processes, field and zero-field cooling, by using a model based on the critical-state model and a magnetic energy minimization procedure. The authors find that by cooling the superconductor near the magnets, one can obtain improved lateral stability as compared to the case of zero-field cooling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]