Magnetic Materials
Researchers develop new method of controlling nanodevices
February 25, 2013 9:46 am | by Bill Kisliuk, UCLA | News | Comments
Electromagnetic devices, from power drills to smart-phones, require an electric current to create the magnetic fields that allow them to function. But researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles have developed a method for switching tiny magnetic fields on and off with an electric field—a sharp departure from the traditional approach of running a current through a wire. The new composite can control magneto-electric activity at a scale of just 10 nm.
Physicists light “magnetic fire” to reveal energy's path
May 13, 2013 3:27 pm | News | Comments
Research on bursts of energy within magnetic systems dates back two decades. But...
New magnetic graphene may revolutionize electronics
May 10, 2013 12:44 pm | News | Comments
Scientists already know that graphene has extraordinary conductive, mechanical, and...
Scientists discover 3D magnetic vortices
May 7, 2013 11:15 am | News | Comments
Magnetic vortices typically occur in nanometer-scale magnetic disks, which are studied...
Scientists find new magic in magnetic material
May 8, 2013 4:04 pm | News | CommentsFrom powerful computers to super-sensitive medical and environmental detectors that are faster, smaller, and use less energy—yes, we want them, but how do we get them? In research that is helping to lay the groundwork for the electronics of the future, University of Delaware scientists have confirmed the presence of a magnetic field generated by electrons which scientists had theorized existed, but that had never been proven until now.
Device launches plasma, holds it together through the air
April 16, 2013 10:12 pm | News | CommentsA University of Missouri engineer has built a system that is able to launch a ring of plasma as far as two feet. Plasma is commonly created in the laboratory using powerful electromagnets, but previous efforts to hold the super-hot material through air have been unsuccessful. The new device does this by changing how the magnetic field around the plasma is arranged.
Manipulating ultrafast spin at terahertz frequencies
April 3, 2013 10:46 am | News | CommentsThe use of femtosecond light pulses—the fastest man-made event—with photon energies ranging from X-rays (as used for instance at the HZB femto-slicing facility) to terahertz spectral range has proved to be an indispensable tool in ultrafast spin and magnetization dynamics studies. Researchers have recently demonstrated a simple but powerful way of manipulating the spins at these unprecedented speeds.
Magnetic nano-droplet discovery presents telecom opportunity
March 20, 2013 5:06 pm | News | CommentsA team that includes researchers from Sweden has successfully created a magnetic soliton, a spin torque-generated nano-droplet that could lead to technological innovation in such areas as mobile telecommunications. This construct was first theorized 35 years ago and scientists have long believed that they exist in magnetic environments, but until now they had never been observed
Engineers make vibration sensor in the quantum world
March 18, 2013 9:21 am | News | CommentsResearchers in France and Germany have found a way to combine both carbon nanotubes with magnetic molecules on the atomic level to build a quantum mechanical system that acts as a vibration sensor. In their experiment the researchers used a carbon nanotube that was mounted between two metal electrodes, spanned a distance of about 1 µm, and could vibrate mechanically.
KAIST develops wireless power transfer tech for high capacity transit
February 13, 2013 9:51 am | News | CommentsEngineers at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) and the Korea Railroad Research Institute have designed a wireless technology that can be applied to high capacity transportation systems such as railways, harbor freight, and airport transportation, and logistics. The technology supplies 60 kHz and 180 kW of power remotely to transport vehicles at a stable, constant rate.
New MRI technique has ability to scan individual cells
February 12, 2013 7:35 am | News | CommentsResearchers have recently demonstrated magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) on the molecular scale through the use of artificial atoms, diamond nanoparticles doped with nitrogen impurity. Conventional MRI responds to the magnetic fields of atomic nuclei, but this new method improves resolution nearly one million times, allowing scientists to probe very weak magnetic fields such as those generated in some biological molecules and even proteins.
Study: First evidence that magnetism helps salmon find home
February 11, 2013 9:24 am | News | CommentsWhen migrating, sockeye salmon typically swim up to 4,000 miles into the ocean and then, years later, navigate back to the upstream reaches of the rivers in which they were born to spawn their young. Scientists have long wondered how salmon find their way to their home rivers over such epic distances. A new study suggests that salmon find their home rivers by sensing the rivers' unique magnetic signature.
Magnetic nanovehicles control, target drug release in the body
January 28, 2013 10:57 am | News | CommentsResearchers in Switzerland have designed tiny vessels that are capable of releasing active agents in the body. These “nanovehicles” are made from a liposome just 100 to 200 nm in diameter. By attaching magnetic iron oxide nanoparticles to the surface, scientists are able to target the vessel, heating it up to release the drug.
Liquid crystal’s chaotic inner dynamics
January 24, 2013 4:08 pm | News | CommentsPhysicists have recently demonstrated that the application of a very strong alternating electric field to thin liquid crystal cells leads to a new distinct nonlinear dynamic effect in the response of the cells. Researchers were able to explain this result through spatio-temporal chaos theory. The finding has implications for the operation of liquid crystal devices because their operation depends on electro-optic switch phenomena.
Quantitative magneto-mechanical made possible by the Barkhausen Effect
January 17, 2013 9:45 pm | News | CommentsThe Barkhausen Effect is the noise in the magnetic output of a ferromagnet when the magnetizing force applied to it is changed. Almost 100 years after its initial discovery, a team of scientists in Alberta have harnessed this effect as a new kind of high-resolution microscopy for the insides of magnetic materials.
Chaotic “spin vortices” could lead to new computer memories
January 3, 2013 7:56 am | News | CommentsIn science, just like in life, sometimes creating the most effective organization depends on being able to handle just a bit of chaos first. Scientists at Argonne National Laboratory have used alternating magnetic fields to control the behavior of "spin vortices" trapped in small dots made from iron and nickel that can be magnetized in two separate ways.
Researchers discover a new kind of magnetism
December 20, 2012 7:39 am | by David L. Chandler, MIT News Office | News | CommentsFollowing up on earlier theoretical predictions, Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers have now demonstrated experimentally the existence of a fundamentally new kind of magnetic behavior, adding to the two previously known states of magnetism.
Physicists achieve elusive “evaporative cooling” of molecules
December 19, 2012 1:55 pm | News | CommentsEvaporative cooling has long been used to cool atoms, but it has never before been done by molecules—two different atoms bonded together. Achieving a goal considered nearly impossible, JILA physicists have done this, chilling a gas of molecules to very low temperatures by adapting the familiar process by which a hot cup of coffee cools.
New insight into an intriguing state of magnetism
December 18, 2012 11:14 am | News | CommentsA team of scientists has studied magnons in a material that becomes helimagnetic below about 30 K: iron silicide doped with cobalt. They investigated how helimagnons evolve as the temperature increases, destroying the magnetic order, as well as how the magnetic phases are affected by an external magnetic field.
Computer memory could increase fivefold with self-assembly
November 13, 2012 7:39 pm | News | CommentsEngineers in Texas have adopted the nanoscale fabrication technique of directed self-assembly to increase the surface storage density of hard disk drives. The method, which relies on block copolymers, is able to organize magnetic dots into patterns far finer than existing methods. And it does so without risking the integrity of the magnetic fields.
Vortex beams produce electron microscopy with a twist
November 5, 2012 3:55 pm | News | CommentsIn a tornado, the individual air particles do not necessarily rotate on their own axis, but the air suction overall creates a powerful rotation. Similar vortex beams are being used in electron microscopy to allow researchers to determine the angular momentum of materials under examination. This ability provides valuable information about a material’s magnetic field. Researchers in Austria have recently produced particularly intense vortex beams.
Earth’s brief polarity reversal linked to other extreme events
October 16, 2012 12:45 pm | News | CommentsFor the first time, three separately found extreme Earth events have been compared by researchers who now believe they may be linked. About 41,000 years ago, a complete and rapid reversal of the geomagnetic field occurred, lasting for just a few hundred years. Around the same time, a super volcano erupted and major climate changes occurred.
Researcher aims to understand strange secrets of magnetotactic bacteria
October 16, 2012 8:44 am | News | CommentsMagnetotactic bacteria are organisms which develop membrane-encapsulated nano-particles known as magnetosomes. Although these microbes were first discovered in 1975, the production of their magnetite crystals is still not fully understood. A researcher in the U.K. is now using computational simulation tools to discover how magnetosomes allow bacteria to orient themselves along the Earth’s magnetic field lines.
X-ray laser reveals fast demagnetization in ferromagnets
October 4, 2012 4:42 am | News | CommentsMagnetized iron can be demagnetized extremely quickly (just a few hundred femtoseconds) when it is radiated with laser light pulses. Researchers in Europe have used x-ray light to reveal a new cause for this loss of magnetism. They found that electrons can move very quickly between areas with different magnetization and polarization, thereby influencing the demagnetization of the material. The effect could play a decisive role in reducing the size of magnetic memories.
Smart fluids could allow chips to assemble themselves
September 19, 2012 4:38 am | by Karen B. Roberts | News | CommentsA University of Delaware research team’s exploration of paramagnetic colloids—microscopic particles that are mere hundredths the diameter of a human hair—has produced the possibility that computer chips could one day build themselves in a scalable fashion. By applying a magnetic field to the colloids, the team build organized crystalline lattices from random solids.
Researchers introduce method for imaging defects in magnetic nanodevices
September 14, 2012 5:24 am | News | CommentsAn international team of researchers have demonstrated a microscopy method to identify magnetic defects in an array of magnetic nanostructures. The method represents an important step towards identifying, measuring, and correcting the magnetic properties of defective devices in future information storage technologies.
How to clean up oil spills
September 12, 2012 3:38 am | by Larry Hardesty, MIT News Office | News | CommentsMassachusetts Institute of Technology researchers have developed a new technique for magnetically separating oil and water that could be used to clean up oil spills. They believe that, with their technique, the oil could be recovered for use, offsetting much of the cleanup cost.
Magnetic insulator shows way to dissipationless electronics
August 20, 2012 8:01 am | News | CommentsA team of researchers at in Japan has demonstrated a new material that promises to eliminate loss in electrical power transmission. Their methodology for solving this classic energy problem is based on a highly exotic type of magnetic semiconductor first theorized less than a decade ago—a magnetic topological insulator.
IBM “waltzes” closer to using spintronics in computing
August 13, 2012 3:01 pm | News | CommentsScientists at IBM Research and ETH Zurich in Switzerland report that they are the first to synchronize electron spins and image the formation of a persistent spin helix in a semiconductor. Until now, it was unclear whether electron spins could preserve encoded information long enough before rotating. This new work extends spin lifetime 30-fold, to 1.1 nanosec.
