David Kasper and George Brown
University of Minnesota
Methods of Experimental Physics Spring 2012
In liquid helium below 2.18K, two components termed the superfluid and normal fluid coexist. In our experiment we attempted to measure the temperature dependence of the relative abundance of the superfluid component of liquid helium. To this end we explored the Helmholtz resonance frequency as we varied the temperature in an experimental cell. The key characteristic of the experimental cell was the presence of filter channels which allowed for the superfluid (which had zero viscosity) to flow freely while preventing the flow of the normal fluid.