Related topics: magnetic properties

'Fool's gold' may be valuable after all

In a breakthrough new study, scientists and engineers at the University of Minnesota have electrically transformed the abundant and low-cost non-magnetic material iron sulfide, also known as "fool's gold" or pyrite, into ...

Tiny magnets mimic steam, water and ice

Researchers at the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) created a synthetic material out of 1 billion tiny magnets. Astonishingly, it now appears that the magnetic properties of this so-called metamaterial change with the temperature, ...

Physicists unveil a theory for a new kind of superconductivity

(PhysOrg.com) -- In this 100th anniversary year of the discovery of superconductivity, physicists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Sweden’s Royal Institute of Technology have published a fully self-consistent ...

Unusual quantum state of matter observed for the first time

It's not every day that someone comes across a new state of matter in quantum physics, the scientific field devoted to describing the behavior of atomic and subatomic particles in order to elucidate their properties.

Iron-nitrogen compound forms strongest magnet known

(PhysOrg.com) -- A group of scientists from the University of Minnesota say that Fe16N2 crystals are more magnetic than the most magnetic material previously known, and its magnetism exceeds the predicted limit of magnetism ...

Physicists discover a new switch for superconductivity

Under certain conditions—usually exceedingly cold ones—some materials shift their structure to unlock new, superconducting behavior. This structural shift is known as a "nematic transition," and physicists suspect that ...

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Magnet

A magnet (from Greek μαγνήτις λίθος magnḗtis líthos, "Magnesian stone") is a material or object that produces a magnetic field. This magnetic field is invisible but is responsible for the most notable property of a magnet: a force that pulls on other ferromagnetic materials and attracts or repels other magnets.

A permanent magnet is one made from a material that stays magnetized. An example is a magnet used to hold notes on a refrigerator door. Materials that can be magnetized, which are also the ones that are strongly attracted to a magnet, are called ferromagnetic (or ferrimagnetic). These include iron, nickel, cobalt, some rare earth metals and some of their alloys (e.g. Alnico), and some naturally occurring minerals such as lodestone.

Although ferromagnetic (and ferrimagnetic) materials are the only ones with an attraction strong enough to a magnet to be commonly considered "magnetic", all other substances respond weakly to a magnetic field, by one of several other types of magnetism.

An electromagnet is made from a coil of wire which acts as a magnet when an electric current passes through it, but stops being a magnet when the current stops. Often an electromagnet is wrapped around a core of ferromagnetic material like steel, which enhances the magnetic field produced by the coil.

The overall strength of a magnet is measured by its magnetic moment, while the local strength of the magnetism in a material is measured by its magnetization.

This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA