The history and science of magnetism

Magnetism

Our understanding being Science and how the world works and by and large the world works just well whether we be aware of it or not. For instance take magnetism, People have known about magnets for many years and they've been using them almost as compasses, for almost as long. The ancient Greeks and Romans knew as well as we do that lodestone can attract other pieces of iron, while the ancient Chinese were making magnetic compasses set in intricate wooden inlays for their practice of Feng Shui (the art of carefully arranging a room) this was thousands of years before interior designers came on board. Science can sometimes be sluggish to catch up but we've only really discovered how magnetism works in the last century, since the world inside atoms was first discovered and explored.

Definition

The origin of the word magnet is from the Greek word magnes, almost undoubtedly from Magnesia in Asia Minor, once an significant source of lodestone.Magnetism being the force that a magnetic object exerts through its magnetic field on another object.The two objects do not have to bodily touch each other for the force to be exerted. The first Object feels the magnetic force from the second Object because of the first Object's surrounding magnetic field.

The knowledge of magnesium has been with humans for many thousands of years. For Example, lodestone is a magnetised form of the iron oxide mineral magnetite. It has the possessions of attracting iron objects. As It is referred to in old European and Asian historical records.

Approximately everyone knows some basic facts about how magnets behave which are the two ends of a margnet that are called poles one of which is known as north pole and the other being south pole The north pole attracts the south pole of a second magnet, while the north pole of one magnet repels the other magnet's north pole. Which brings us to this common saying" like poles repel, unlike poles attract."A magnet creates an hidden area of magnetism all around it called a magnetic field.The north pole of a magnet points approximately toward Earth's north pole and vice-versa. That's because Earth itself contains magnetic materials and behaves like a gigantic magnet.If you hack a bar magnet in half, it's a bit like cutting an earthworm in half! You get two brand new, smaller magnets, each with its own north and south pole.If you move a magnet a few times over an unmagnetized piece of a magnetic material such as an iron nail you can exchange it into a magnet as well and that process is called magnetization. The might of the field around a magnet depends on how close you get, it's strongest very near the magnet and falls off quickly as you move away and that's why a small magnet on your table has to be quite close to things to attract them.Magnetic field can be measured in units called gauss and Tesla being the modern SI unit, named for Croatian-born U.S. electricity pioneer Nikola Tesla, 1856 -- 1943. It's fascinating to note that the strength of Earth's magnetic field is about 1000 times weaker than that of a typical bar magnet. On Earth gravity is the force that sticks you to the floor and not magnesium We'd notice Earth's magnetism much extra if its gravity weren't so very strong.

Conclusion

Electromagnets demonstrate that you can make magnetism using electricity. As European scientists discovered in the 19th century, electricity always makes magnetism when it moves about or changes. Every moment an electric current flows back and forth in a wire, it generates a magnetic field all around it. Changing electricity, in short, produces magnetis and the reverse is true

Reference

Lee, E.W.: Magnetism, An Introductory Survey, Dover Publications Inc. (1970)

CullityB.D, Graham .C, D. Introduction to Magnetic Materials (2 ed.2008). Wiley-IEEE. p. 103.

ISBN 0471477419