Slashdot Mirror
Moldable Magnets
leb writes, "What if researchers could create a tough, lightweight, moldable material, with "tunable" magnetic properties? Molded into different shapes, such a material might someday prove useful for high-density data storage, anti-static coatings for aircraft or spacecraft, and a
host of other applications. A first step toward tunable, ceramic magnets is reported by a group of researchers from University of Toronto. "
Just one more piece of the puzzle for Canada's impending world domination... But seriously. I wonder if means that someone will actually invent the "chick magnet".
I do. I really do. I Blame Canada for this!
--
then it comes to be that the soothing light at the end of your tunnel is just a freight train coming your way
I've no idea if that's still in the plan, but the idea is still viable, I'd imagine, and would definitely help study the structure of the material, if not gain insight into ways to improve it.
such technology could also greatly impact maglev trains. rails could be further optimized to maximize lift and speed
I have escaped from my prison on the Fridge door. Now I will take over the world with my moldable magnets!
None will be able to repel me[1]. You will all bow before me or I shall use my magnets to redirect all the ships in the world and mess up your TV screens[2].
If you then do not give in, I shall magnetically erase all your disks.
All I have to do is work out a way to defeat my nemesis - Captain Stainless and his sidekick Aluminium Boy!
[1]Except magnets with the same polarity
[2]This may not apply to you if you are not using a CRT based screen.
They've managed to embed iron filings in rubber. Forgive me but is this really new? I used to have such a toy when I was a kid.
threadeds blog
You don't need moldable magnets for that. You can magnetize any hunk of metal and therefore any metal statue (but not stone, so it couldn't be petrified). The trick with these things is that they could be reshaped while remaining magnetic, and I don't think you want anyone doing that to your statue.
Cambridge uni boffins have just announced a magnetic chip design supposedly 40 odd thousand times more power efficient than the silicon flavour. This BBC article has the full story.
henry [ w i r e t r a p . n e t ]
Well, first of all, an anti-static coating needs to be conductive, magetic properties are irrelevant for static control.
Second, they say the material has to be heated to 500 degrees Celsius as part of the fabrication procedure. Are they planning to bake entire airplanes and spacecraft at 500 degrees?
Of course, if they manage to make iron nanoclusters with the exact number of atoms to optimize magnetic properties, this would be interesting for data storage. Expect to see cheaper hardisks with more capacity in the future. But bigger, cheaper HDs cannot be called "news" anymore, can they?
Moderators, take note:
1)Read the moderation guidelines before moderating anything
Researchers at Penn St. are using magnetic fields to try and make viable antimatter propulsion. It can also be used for more efficient nuclear propulsion (think easily thrustable and safer).
Electric car engines with tunable properties; I would think it would make for a much more efficient engine.
I would also like a lightweight, flexible, magnetic body suit so I can play around in a strong magnetic field to simulate low gravity.
It can also revolutionize the Fridge door magnet industry.
IANAL, but I play one on
I also don't see the static connection.
But the temperatures reached in manufacturing the material are very different from the temperatures that they need to subject the entire craft to. If you don't believe me consider what temperatures steel is made at and ask if they ever have to heat the entire plane to that temperature...
And about hard drives. Moore's law is faster for them than for other components. If current trends continue the in the next decade it will become reasonable to replace RAM with miniature hard drives!
Cheers,
Ben
My usual seat in the cluetrain is at A HREF="http://pub4.ezboard.com/biwethey.ht
Woohoo. Just when 1/32 slot cars are coming back, here come moldable magnets. Just perfect for people who don't spend too much time outdoors (geeks fit this stereotype well!) - we have an resurging hobby for the technologically advanced or inept.
These moldable magnets would be perfect for tuning your race car to either hug the rails, or slide the back end around a bit.
www.oldweirdherald.com
www.radtrax.com
www.slotcargarage.com
www.fantasyworldhobbies.com
www.ncphobbies.com
There was this dubious flirtation with something called bubble memory- it was non-volitile, no moving parts and could be abused, unlike the data drives of it's day. Unfortunately, they couldn't speed it up to match the speed of the drives of that day and it was ferociously expensive to make. This seems like they've found a way to make bubble memory on steroids or something along the line of a magnetic field driven semiconductor switch. I want to see some papers describing this in detail.
I know that many people might find this quesiton stupid, but anyways, how would a magnetic material be anti-static? (I slept through most of my basic science classes in hs ;) )
Hrm loving these
Correct me if I'm wrong, but there are a few things I don't understand about the prospects of using this material for data storage. Why is flexible better? The reason hard drives are hard is because you can get excelent point precision on the surface and hence higher data density. Also, since it's just a magnetic surface, it should be just as good for that sort of stuff as anything else we have on the market unless they are trying to imply that the magnetic properties of the drive are mutable only by the heat method. I think that might have a tendency to destroy neighboring data. :)
- learn mathematics - shoot dope -
You're obviously forgetting the most important potential use for 'moldable magnets': Making an awesome refrigerator decorating scheme that will be the envy of many. --- A loaded gun? Windows 2000? What's the difference?
What's the big deal? I've got a whole collection of molded magnets on my refrigerator door. I've got them in the shape of plumbers vans, pizzas, even mickey mouse.
Work for Change & GET PAID!
I'm ready for the "Magna-condom": See Your Sexual Powers Increase Twentyfold! Let the scientifically acclaimed powers of magnets regain some of the "attraction" you've lost! "I can't believe it," said 62-year-old Ed Powers. "I haven't felt this randy since I was 17! I pop it on and 'Poof, we have liftoff, if ya know what I'm saying!'" Only $29.95 for a 6 pack! CALL NOW, 1-800-GET-LIFT
---
DO NOT DISTURB THE SE
Don't Eat your Magna-doh!
I don't know about anyone else here, but I can see how this could help create vastly more efficient transformers. Each transformer has a unique resonant frequency - the one it transforms most efficiently at. This is also the least "noisy" frequency to convert at - the waveform makes it through without looking like a lawnmower went over it. If we can tune these things to 50 or 60hz that would be.. well.. awesome.
It is truly a great day for everyone.
Scientists at a top research facility have theorized on a possible application of the use of this magnetic material as a random access stroage medium in computers. Tiny doughnut-shaped rings of the material would be located at every intersection in a grid of thin wires strung along two axes. Any single magnetic ring can be addressed via two wires (one on each axis). A third wire will wind its way through all of the magnetic rings along a diagonal pattern. To store a bit, the x,y wires will receive a large pulse of current. The polarity of this pulse determines wheather a '1' or a '0' is to be stored in the tiny ring. To read the bit back, Another pulse (always in the same polarity is sent down the x,y axes again). Depending on the currently magnetized state of the ring, a differing current pulse level will be detected in the 3rd wire which can be used to interpret the stored value. Since this pulse may destroy the bit value stored in the magnetic ring, the value just read must be written back immediately to the ring. This exciting new technology means that someday, computers may have many planes of vast grids of these tiny magnetic beads as their primary work storage. And will shrink the size computers down greatly while making them much faster. Scientists have yet to name this new technology and will turn to the public for ideas on this matter. Yes folks, it's an exciting time to be alive!
While I found the idea intriguing, I wondered about how safe this type of thing is in the long run. As I understand it, magnetic fields are not all that great for the life of biological cells. This is supposedly the basis (or at least one of) for the relatively new standards of shielded, Low-radiation monitors, PC's, TV's etc,etc..
In fact it has been proven that excessive use of cell-phones can cause brain tumours. The fact that these gizmo's have shrunk 10-fold from their initial release is very misleading since they are still emitting enough rads to send a signal to a local cell tower.
And what about all the cases of children living near power lines and such being exponentially more likely to get lukemia.. I hate being a spoilsport, but it looks like adding more magetic radiation to the *human background* isn't really all that great an idea, and I don't really see that there is a difference between *emissions* and *strong emissions*.
So Even if this is theoretically amazing, in practical use we would need to ack the need for something like shielding or whatever other additional materia required between us and the emissions; driving costs up and usefullness down.
They don't seem to say much about the strength of the magnets that would be created in this way. It would be nice to know whether we should be thinking about levitating trains or sticking slot-cars to tracks.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
As far as I remember in my Chemistry degree, the only material other than Iron that exhibited ferromagentic properties were derivatives of that enigmatic C60 molecule, buckminsterfullerine. This research isn't the true way forward, while we are gaining magnet hybrids, the magnetic element is still metallic. The most exciting research comes from these organic magnets, which can be used for infinate different things.
:o)
... :o)
Unfortunately, as far as I remember, the only decent non-metallic ferromagnet only kicks in at about 35 Kelvin. But research is underway to make an organic magnet that exhibits ferromagnetic properties at the temperature of liquid nitrogen, a much more industrially workable temperature. But, I can't see a 3 metre squared cooling unit just so I can have a 300 TB hard drive
Boring yes, but I'm sure someone out there finds it interesting
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken.
COOL! Here's another application: I bet if you tuned some magnets to radiate at the right frequency, you might be able to heat food!
"You can't get something for nothing." - my grandfather, on the stock market and Reaganomics.
One with a magnetic personality?
Speaking of low temp magents and liquid nitrogen.
If they can incorporate an iron/polymer materials at a molecular level to ceramics, maybe we could finally make some more commerically productive uses of the Meiser effect through incorporation of some more rare magnetic materials.
Finally, I could live in a house that floats a foot or two off the ground! (Just don't flush the toilet or turn on any lights. )
Except by current technology, I'd only need about 5000 gal of liquid nitrogen to cool down the superconducting material.
make it a little more jelly like, combine it with lots of intricate technology amd some AI - and tada you got a changeling!
Actually this could have some cool implications for morphing technology.
What about Nickel (magnetic coins) and Cobalt?
Hands in my pocket
HD vs RAM is what counts, and HD speed and density is improving faster than RAM.
Cheers,
Ben
My usual seat in the cluetrain is at A HREF="http://pub4.ezboard.com/biwethey.ht
Well, this fulfils my secret desire for magnetic FIMO so that my clay creations can stick to the refrigerator with exactly the strength I desire.
(serious) Actually, I suspect that it's the fine-tunable field strength of this material that will prove truly useful. Magnets can already be made in pretty much any shape that is required.
I remember coming up with what I thought was a neat idea for my TV/DVD cabinet. I cut holes in the side and installed a good quality pair of car audio speakers on each side of the cabinet. I fugures, car audio was designed to produce good sound *and* not take up a lot of space (I have no rrom for huge speaker cabinets). Installed everything just fine, flip on the TV... and the color is all distorted on the upper right side (near the speaker). Asked on the web and got a lot of ficticious, urban legend, sorta, kinda, maybe bullshit info about how you can "magnetically shield" speakers. Oh, the shield has to have certain ferrous properties, be so thick, etc. Nothing worked. Shielding was pure crock science right up there with phrenology. I was ready to tear the speakers out. But I finally came up with a solution. I taped tiny ceramic magnets on the read right backside of the TV set. The magnets would exactly counteract (local near the TV) the effects from the distant speaker (so as not to affect its operation). One tine magnet would fix ne area of the screen. The next magnet placed a few cm down cleaned up the next area. I just kept taping magnets by sliding them about over the back of the case until the screen looked better and then taped it there. Now I have a perfect picture on a TV 15 inches away from a huge 32 oz speaker magnet. And good sound. Shielding? Bah. Local magnetic cancellation. Not that actually worked and was cheaper to implement too. And since the magnets reside on the rear side of the set, they are not visible from the front like a huge chunk of metal "shielding" would be.
Can somebody either describe to me or point me to a description of how you would use these little magnetic elements to create logic elements?
(speaking of baked...)
In spite of reason.
It is in the interest of your personal safety that you read this. My name is Amadou. I was shot to death by N.Y. police officers for fitting the 'description' of a rapist. That is to say I was a person with dark skin. I was shot because my skin color mistakenly identified me as someone who might possess a gun and attempt to shoot police officers. I had no gun. I had no gun and now I am dead because I was unfortunate enough to have dark skin color matching that of a rapist. The New York police officers believed I would shoot them because of my skin color. The belief of danger means the four police officers were legally entitled to shoot me 46 times. I am dead. I had no gun. I was not a rapist. The police officers who shot me are found NOT GUILTY of any of the charges brought against them arising out of my murder. I was unfortunate enough to have dark skin and to find myself in front of a firing squad of white police officers who mistook me for a rapist with a gun about to shoot them. I still have dark skin but now I am dead. The officers walk free. They can shoot you next. They need only believe you to be a threat. I hope that you do not have dark skin. Mistakes are made.
Saucer wisdom by Rudy Rucker, is a nifty little book about the future as seen through an alien abductee... trust me, it makes sense. The author discusses exactly this type of substance in-depth. I betcha the U of T guys are just pulling off of Rucker's style!
Drives with 40x the storage would be nice, but just get a magnet by one. Be just like the floppies of old.
Everytime you look at porn a devil gets their horns.
I think we should see a little less of this, and a little more of the important stuff... I don't see what the big deal is over a magnet. Some scientists oughta think things thru and ask if this is really needed. They should be working on more important things, like free AND fast internet service ;-)
"As many of you know, I was very instrumental in the founding of the Internet" --Al Gore to Katie Couric 3/99
and please don't waste your time just telling me how wrong I am because of some stupid reason like: Now we're one step closer to babe magnets! and that's important. I am getting tired of those comments...
"As many of you know, I was very instrumental in the founding of the Internet" --Al Gore to Katie Couric 3/99
If it's really malleable, it would just force itself
back into a neutral shape.
Saw some great technology related posts but let's not forget what this could do for the medical world. Some say the magnetic therapy doesn't hold much water but I think it makes sense (after all we do have minerals like iron floating around our insides).
These moldable magnets maybe could be used in sugical applications to help increase steady blood flow. For example, to coat that pin you just got in your [leg/hip/elbow], increase circulation and speed up the healing process. I'm sure heart patients could benefit greatly from this as well.
Well, that's my 2 cents...
Ranger X
You mean he actually acknowledged the existance of Slashdot this time? Unlike a year ago, when he made no mention of it whatsoever.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.