Magnets in flux

Illustration of a magnetic field - Researchers at the Institute for Quantum Matter prove that mechanically manipulating a certain type of metal can change its magnetic properties, ushering in new applications for the rare and underutilized field of piezomagnetism A team of physicists at the Johns Hopkins Institute for Quantum Matter has discovered that they can control a metal's electromagnetic properties by manipulating it mechanically. The finding suggests potential developments in the technologies involved in magnetic random access memory, or RAM, as well as other applications. Scientists usually manipulate a material's magnetic state by applying a magnetic field or by passing an electric current through it. The discovery that stretching or compressing the metal can also control its electromagnetic properties was unexpected, says Oleg Tchernyshyov , a co-author of a paper published in Nature Physics that outlines the findings. "Imagine you squeeze a magnet and that changes the direction of the orientation of its magnetic dipoles. That's hard to imagine, but in this case it works like that. So it was a rather unusual finding," said Tchernyshyov, a professor in the William H. Miller III Department of Physics and Astronomy.