Quench detection specifically targets the moment a superconducting magnet begins transitioning out of its superconducting state, typically sensed through voltage taps, fibre optics or Hall sensors watching for a resistive normal zone. Damage detection is the broader category covering structural or electrical faults that may or may not be quench-related. This dataset combines both search frames because the sensing techniques — voltage monitoring, fibre-optic strain sensing, current-distribution monitoring — overlap heavily across the two problems. In practice, most filings that mention detection time and noise immunity are quench-specific, while structural crack-monitoring patents like the featured fibre-optic record sit on the damage-detection side.

The ranking covers 100 assignees and is led by a filer with 39 records out of 924 total, with fifth place at 16 and tenth place at 13. That is a meaningful lead but not a dominant one — the top 5 assignees combined account for only 12.8% of all 924 records in scope, and the top 10 combined reach 20.3%. This tells you the field has one identifiable leader surrounded by a long tail of moderate and single-filing entrants rather than two or three firms controlling the space.

No, not on the current data. Filings rose from 31 in 2017 to a peak of 71 in 2022, then declined toward 9 in the most recent, still-partial year. Because publication typically lags actual filing by around 18 months, the last one to two years will always look weaker than they eventually turn out to be, but the decline from the 2022 peak through the following years is consistent enough to read as a genuine slowdown rather than a reporting artefact. Several actively-filing assignees also show zero filings in the latest year.

Material analysis and testing (G01N) and electric/magnetic measurement (G01R) are the two largest IPC subclasses, covering 26.3% and 21.3% of the 924 records respectively. Testing machine and structural balance (G01M) and magnets/inductors/transformers (H01F) follow at 12.8% and 11.3%. Protective circuit arrangements (H02H), which cover what happens once a quench is confirmed rather than how it is detected, sit lower at 7.4% — worth noting if you are evaluating where claim density is lighter.

The technology composition data points toward the response side of the workflow — protective circuit arrangements and energy extraction sit at 7.4% of records, well below the sensing-heavy classes above it. Co-assignee data also shows only 10 joint-filing pairs across the whole dataset, meaning most organisations are working alone rather than pooling detection and protection expertise. A first claim combining a specific sensing modality — fibre-optic strain arrays or Hall-sensor current mapping — with a defined protective-circuit response is likely to sit on less crowded prior art than a pure detection claim.