New Class of "Non-Joulian" Magnets Change Volume In Magnetic Field 39
Zothecula notes an announcement from the University of Maryland saying they have developed a new class of magnets, called "Non-Joulian" magnets, which physically expand in the presence of a magnetic field. "In the 1840s, physicist James Prescott Joule discovered that iron-based magnetic materials changed their shape but not their volume when placed in a magnetic field. This phenomenon is referred to as "Joule Magnetostriction," and since its discovery 175 years ago, all magnets have been characterized on this basis." Another significant property of these new magnets is that they can harvest or convert energy with very little waste heat (abstract). The magnets are created when thermally-treated, iron-based alloys are heated in a furnace, then rapidly cooled. When they reach room temperature, they have an odd, almost cellular shape on the microscopic level. The researchers say the magnets have numerous applications for energy-efficient sensors and actuators.
I'm strangly attracted to this concept. (Score:5, Funny)
sure, we lose money on every magnet we produce and sell, but we make it up on volume.
Maurice, you naughty little monkey (Score:3)
King Joulian says he expands the mostest and has a magentically attractive mating dance.
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how many months? (Score:2)
Will my Joulian magnets hold my Julian calendar on the wall?
Cool (Score:3)
Now for a Jamming Gripper [cornell.edu] that works...in space!
Re:free energy (Score:5, Funny)
Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
Publicly Funded Research (Score:5, Insightful)
According to the articles, the alloy isn't particularly exotic and the processing isn't difficult. I'd love to know what they specifically used. Sadly, they published in Nature. So I can view the paper for $5 or download as PDF for $32. Or, you know, subscribe for $200. What I don't get is why I, as one of the millions of taxpayers that funded this research, don't have free access to the paper.
Yes. I know. Preaching to the choir, OA journals, etc. That still doesn't change the fact that I find this both irritating and wrong.
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Go to a library.
Re:Publicly Funded Research (Score:4, Insightful)
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Yeah, but then they'll charge access for it, and the copyright cartel will insist we're not allowed to see anything without paying them a trillion dollars.
Hey, wait a minute ... that's exactly what we have now.
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It's available in all libraries, you just have to know where to look. They're down in the cellar, in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying 'Beware of the Leopard'.
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Go to a library.
What century are you living in?
The results of publicly funded research must be made publicly available, in a manner appropriate for the current century.
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Todays library is called The Pirate bay.
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Can you actually find torrents for academic journals? That would be quite a public service by whoever's taking the time to scan them.
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OMG, I can't leave my basement! Everything MUST come to me in a form I consider most convenient!
If you go to an appropriate library they have computers on which you download academic journals (funded by your tax dollars even!). If you go to the wrong library, they might have to order a paper copy for you, but paper does have a long and glorious history. Embrace it!
Or you can read the open access journals. Just don't, uh, believe everything you read. Or you can wait the six months until the authors have
Re:Publicly Funded Research (Score:4, Interesting)
Aaron Swartz thought the same thing...
Re:Publicly Funded Research (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Publicly Funded Research (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm 50. Is that the generation you're referring to? I'm also 1/2 of a two-engineer household. My yearly income taxes are significantly more than an entry level engineering salary - you know, the taxes that already helped to pay for the research. Don't tell me I'm not making any effort and don't jump to conclusions about "my generation" because you obviously know fuck all about it.
But hey. You're a smart person. You know all about me. My political views. My library status. Guess what? You're just as wrong about all of them. Absolutely every assumption you made was 100% wrong. Amazing. I would imagine you must get used to being wrong a lot though.
Instead of blathering on with your erroneous, ignorant opinions, maybe you ought to take a good long look at yourself and realize you're actually preaching to yourself. Geez. What a douchebag.
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What I don't get is why I, as one of the millions of taxpayers that funded this research, don't have free access to the paper.
Yes. I know. Preaching to the choir, OA journals, etc. That still doesn't change the fact that I find this both irritating and wrong.
You don't get free access because the authors chose not to post a preprint/author's draft online and also chose not to submit to an open access journal. Why not pay the $35 and then deduct it from your taxes? :)
Frankly, I'd be more pissed about how you also don't have free access to the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement.
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Costs are public, profits are private.
That's a compromise reached after raw capitalism's "costs are someone else's problem" resulted in near-collapse of the entire system. The problem is, it's impossible to calculate the ultimate costs of any action (install automation? That causes layoffs, which causes poverty, which causes crime, which caused the hit-and-run that killed your cousi
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*In the form of paying for lawyers, accountants and legislators to facilitate avoiding them.
The rest of your post is right on the money. I stay awake a lot of nights wondering what the other side of that phase transition from capitalism will look like. Obviously,
Deducing Fe-Ga (Score:5, Interesting)
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Water, fire, air and dirt... (Score:2)
...non-Joulian magnets, how do they work?