Mercury (element) is used in thermometers, barometers, manometers, sphygmomanometers, float valves, mercury switches, mercury relays, fluorescent lamps and other devices, though concerns about the element's toxicity have led to mercury thermometers and sphygmomanometers being largely phased out in clinical environments in favor of alternatives such as alcohol- or galinstan-filled glass thermometers and thermistor- or infrared-based electronic instruments. Likewise, mechanical pressure gauges and electronic strain gauge sensors have replaced mercury sphygmomanometers. Mercury remains in use in scientific research applications and in amalgam for dental restoration in some locales. It is also used in fluorescent lighting. Electricity passed through mercury vapor in a fluorescent
Cryogenic Rare Event Search with Superconducting Thermometers Cryogenic Rare Event Search with Superconducting Thermometers The Cryogenic Rare Event Search with Superconducting Thermometers (CRESST) is a collaboration of European experimental particle physics groups involved in the construction of cryogenic detectors for direct dark matter searches. The participating institutes are the Max Planck Institute for Physics (Munich), Technische Universität München, Universität Tübingen, University of Oxford (Great Britain) and the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN, Italy). The CRESST collaboration currently runs an array of cryogenic detectors in the underground laboratory of the Gran Sasso National Laboratory. The modular detectors used by CRESST facilitate discrimination of background radiation events by