• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.16 no.7
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• pp.439-444
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• 2006

An apparatus capable of melting and solidifying various materials containerlessly in high vacuum via electrostatic levitation (ESL) has been developed for finding materials with new or improved properties and further building a database for processing materials in microgravity. Containerless solidification of semiconductors, metals, and alloys such as Si, Zr, Nb, Mo, $V_3Si$, and boron carbides has been carried out to test how various materials at how high temperatures can be processed by ESL. The materials in levitation became spherical at melting by their own surface tensions which were ideal for measuring intrinsic thermophysical properties of materials in the liquid state. Multiple cycles of melting and cooling were reproducibly repeated and radiative cooling curves were recorded.