Jan 17, 2013 |
Quantitative magneto-mechanical detection and control of the Barkhausen Effect
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(Nanowerk News) Almost 100 years after the initial discovery, a team of scientists at the University of Alberta and the National Institute for Nanotechnology in Edmonton have harnessed the Barkhausen Effect as a new kind of high-resolution microscopy for the insides of magnetic materials. ("Quantitative Magneto-Mechanical Detection and Control of the Barkhausen Effect")
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The researchers say the technique has the potential to provide critical information as a rapid prototyper for magnetic computational devices that expand the role of magnetism within computers.
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In 1919, Barkhausen discovered the first evidence of magnetic domains (patterns in how the directions of magnetism are organized, which occur inside all magnetic materials). This marked a milestone in the development of the modern understanding of magnetism.
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The Alberta researchers measure the Barkhausen jumps of magnetization for a special 'vortex' pattern, which is scanned around the inside of their sample by the application of magnetic fields.
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Analysis of the jumps converts the vortex pattern into a probe of magnetic interactions on the scale of billionths of a metre. The analysis was made possible by a model describing the 'stick-slip nature of the jumps; an effect describable previously only in complex computer simulations.
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