In a Lab Accident, Scientists Create the First-Ever Permanently Magnetic Liquid (livescience.com) 81
The Grim Reefer shares a report from Live Science: For the first time, scientists have created a permanently magnetic liquid. These liquid droplets can morph into various shapes and be externally manipulated to move around, according to a new study. Thomas Russell, a distinguished professor of polymer science and engineering at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and his team created these liquid magnets by accident while experimenting with 3D printing liquids at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (where Russell is also a visiting faculty scientist). The goal was to create materials that are solid but have characteristics of liquids for various energy applications.
One day, postdoctoral student and lead author Xubo Liu noticed 3D-printed material, made from magnetized particles called iron-oxides, spinning around in unison on a magnetic stir plate. So when the team realized the entire construct, not just the particles, had become magnetic, they decided to investigate further. Using a technique to 3D-print liquids, the scientists created millimeter-size droplets from water, oil and iron-oxides. The liquid droplets keep their shape because some of the iron-oxide particles bind with surfactants -- substances that reduce the surface tension of a liquid. The surfactants create a film around the liquid water, with some iron-oxide particles creating part of the filmy barrier, and the rest of the particles enclosed inside, Russell said. The team then placed the millimeter-size droplets near a magnetic coil to magnetize them. But when they took the magnetic coil away, the droplets demonstrated an unseen behavior in liquids -- they remained magnetized. (Magnetic liquids called ferrofluids do exist, but these liquids are only magnetized when in the presence of a magnetic field.) A video of the new material has been posted to YouTube. The researchers say their findings could lead to a revolutionary class of printable liquid devices for a variety of applications from artificial cells that deliver targeted cancer therapies to flexible liquid robots that can change their shape to adapt to their surroundings.
One day, postdoctoral student and lead author Xubo Liu noticed 3D-printed material, made from magnetized particles called iron-oxides, spinning around in unison on a magnetic stir plate. So when the team realized the entire construct, not just the particles, had become magnetic, they decided to investigate further. Using a technique to 3D-print liquids, the scientists created millimeter-size droplets from water, oil and iron-oxides. The liquid droplets keep their shape because some of the iron-oxide particles bind with surfactants -- substances that reduce the surface tension of a liquid. The surfactants create a film around the liquid water, with some iron-oxide particles creating part of the filmy barrier, and the rest of the particles enclosed inside, Russell said. The team then placed the millimeter-size droplets near a magnetic coil to magnetize them. But when they took the magnetic coil away, the droplets demonstrated an unseen behavior in liquids -- they remained magnetized. (Magnetic liquids called ferrofluids do exist, but these liquids are only magnetized when in the presence of a magnetic field.) A video of the new material has been posted to YouTube. The researchers say their findings could lead to a revolutionary class of printable liquid devices for a variety of applications from artificial cells that deliver targeted cancer therapies to flexible liquid robots that can change their shape to adapt to their surroundings.
How can they know it's permanent? (Score:1)
How can they know that it's permanent if it hasn't been in use for decades or centuries or millennia to prove that it actually is very long lasting?
Re:How can they know it's permanent? (Score:5, Interesting)
There are likely some actual tests they have attempted to see if they can undo the changes made. And if they cannot undo them easily or if the fluid does not revert without some very direct and intentional manipulation, they likely considered the conclusion that it is permanent.
Kinda like how even permanent markers are not actually permanent, especially if you paint over them, sure they are still there but I think you are getting the idea. Try not to take the claims too far down the rabbit hole.
Permanent does not mean that normal physics has stopped working.
You keep using that word... (Score:2, Informative)
There are likely some actual tests they have attempted to see if they can undo the changes made. And if they cannot undo them easily or if the fluid does not revert without some very direct and intentional manipulation, they likely considered the conclusion that it is permanent.
Kinda like how even permanent markers are not actually permanent, especially if you paint over them, sure they are still there but I think you are getting the idea. Try not to take the claims too far down the rabbit hole.
Permanent does not mean that normal physics has stopped working.
I do not think it means what YOU think it means.
"Permanent" doesn't mean forever and eternal. In this context, a permanent magnet isn't one that is magnetic no matter what. You can demagnetize a so-called permanent magnet, remagnetize it, and magnetize things that aren't previously permanent.
The reason thery're called permanent is that they aren't only magnetic under circumstances of having an external magnetic field applied to them. Generally, an electromagnet is temporary. Remove the electricity and i
Re: How can they know it's permanent? (Score:1)
Permanent magnets arnt really permanent anyway. They all slowly lose their charge over time. A neodynium magnet in your headphones will lose 5% of its charge over 100years.
Re: (Score:2)
Well first they printed an "infinitely long tube" of the material, and then they used that to prove their theory.
Permanence doesn't matter, it's not liquid (Score:3)
Whether or not it's actually a permanent magnet is the wrong question to ask. The question is whether or not it's a liquid, and that answer is no. It's a suspension of solids and liquid and emulsified fats. It may not even be correct to call it a fluid. By their own admission it is the solid iron oxides in the "construct" that are magnetic, and the droplets are keeping their shape because of the way the solid particles interact with surfactants.
Re: (Score:2)
Whether or not your correction is splitting hairs is going to come down to context I'd think. For the most part if you need a magnetic fluid before and couldn't find one you now have your answer but since part of any practical use will include things like accounting for wear from those iron particles and concentration of the same. With mixed composition solid materials we would traditionally only make such a correction and highlight the distinction where practically relevant.
Re: (Score:2)
Whether or not your correction is splitting hairs is going to come down to context I'd think.
Regarding context, that is is likely a fair assessment, though I wouldn't necessarily call it splitting hairs. It's what divides this between an engineering achievement of moderate coolness factor, and a scientific achievement of Nobel magnitude.
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For the most part if you need a magnetic fluid before and couldn't find one you now have your answer
Absolutely not. If it was a liquid that part would probably be true, but since it is a suspension, the vast majority of potential applications that somebody might have thought of for a "magnetic fluid" would not work with something like this. It will be very narrow use cases that benefit, and it will depend narrowly on the specific details of the engineering they can achieve.
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Thank you, I had the exact same thought. It sounds useful, but it doesn't sound like a "liquid."
It is probably a fluid, if they say it is, because the definition is based on flow not structure. Even dry aggregates can sometimes be considered a fluid.
Re: (Score:2)
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The breakdown of materials is well-studied and the chemistry is understood, and from the state of the materials you can calculate the magnetic field using Maxwell's Equations.
You use an empirical study (done under harsh conditions for a short time such that it simulates a longer period of time) to make engineering claims about a specific product, but for the theoretical predictions you use a rational approach instead.
Private Equity (Score:3)
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Yup they have to make sure cancer isn't cured, only treated with an expensive ongoing treatment.
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Really? (Score:1)
Isn't this like grinding up a HDD's platter coating and suspending it in the oil? That stuff keeps a magnetic charge; at least it did the last time I saved something to disk. Can't the reporter tell the difference between a liquid and a liquid emulsion that includes q second thing in suspension?
Re: (Score:2)
He said interesting not mysterious
Re: Really? (Score:2)
You've confused together two things. An emulsion is a suspension of one liquid in another. This is a suspension of a solid in a liquid. Permanent suspensions of solids in liquids with very small particle sizes are called colloids. However, their claim is different still. They're claiming that they removed the suspended solid from the liquid so that only liquid was left and that that liquid was magnetic. That's the new thing here. I'm not so sure about their claims, however, as the procedure from what I read
This is how you get ... (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
No, no, no - superheroes get their powers by accident, often due to clumsiness or stupidity*. Supervillains are smart and generally gain their powers by design.
* “Stupidity” also covers the cases where a third party experimented on the person and inadvertently gave them powers, since the (soon-to-be) superhero was too dumb to see through the other person’s flimsy pretext.
Re: (Score:2)
Nationalism is the virtue of the monster. Please check your hate speech at the door.
Proof? (Score:2)
The scientists can print various shapes from a tiny drop to infinitely long tubes...
Provide infinitely long tube as proof or GTFO.
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Oh come ON (Score:5, Funny)
”... flexible liquid robots that can change their shape to adapt to their surroundings.”
Seriously, have these people never gone to the movies?
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There are only two movies.
The Goonies, and Heartbeeps.
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What about T4? :P
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Hmmm.... A poly-magnetic alloy?
Horror movie premise starts "In a lab accident": (Score:4, Insightful)
Name your creature/artificial being or other abomination against nature.
It's easy to do when you start with those three words.
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Four*
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I'll go with Godzilla vs. Mecha-Godzilla vs. Magneto-Godzilla.
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Labs are everywhere, there's got to be a million of them. And what's the number of actual horrible things that start with a lab accident and have an impact beyond the building? Nothing comes to mind.
T-1000 (Score:1)
Finally we can build the shape-changing terminator..!
You're late with your Terminator reference (Score:1)
If you were going for funny or informative, this remark was supposed to be the first post. Go back to the future where you came from, recalibrate the time machine, and try again.
Comic books are intruding on reality (Score:2)
Any headline that starts, "In an a lab accident, scientists create..." sounds like it belongs in a comic book universe.
semantic vomit comet (Score:2)
Especially after an accidental discovery, the de rigueur sign-off "the researchers say" evokes in me the stomach-churning sensation of my brain cells going over a cliff en masse like so many lemmings, and sure enough—even with my e