Space

Scientists Create Natural Meteoritic Magnet In Ten Days

Rosanna Singh
First Posted: Nov 18, 2015 02:17 PM EST

Researchers have created rare-earth free magnet that has high levels of iron and nickel (FeNi), at the Tohoku University in Japan. This type of FeNi magnetic object is usually found in natural meteorites and normally takes millions of years to form, but these researchers built their artificial cosmic magnet in ten days.

These researchers also created their rare-earth free FeNi magnet in a cost effective way, while using simple industrial technology, according to the study.

High quality magnets have a demand in numerous applications, ranging from household appliances and automobiles to medical equipment. However, it is difficult for industries to procedure high quality energy-saving devices and machines with magnets that are free from rare earth elements.

In the 1960s, researchers became aware that small amounts of FeNi magnets were present in natural meteorites, where the cooling process takes millions of years. Researchers thought that it was impossible to create these materials artificially over a short period of time, since the elements diffuse at a low pace when they are being formed.

The researchers compared their method to like travelling in a time-machine, since the time frame for creating a magnet was reduced from billions of years to ten days.

The findings of this study were published in Scientific Reports.

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