Magnetism

    Everyone knows when some metals become close together, they tend to attract and stick to one another. But then if you rotate one to a different end they repel. Weird stuff, right? It's sure fun to play with. Well, that's magnetism for you.

 (5*)   Magnetism is a very weird topic but its an important concept for much of our current technology. After all, without it humans would not have a majority of anything we have today.

    Typically magnetism appears in a way very similar to the picture above. A North pole and a South pole on an object with field lines flowing into and out of the two ends. However, magnetism doesn't have to result just from a chunk of material found to be naturally magnetized.

      Magnetism can be found or even created, often in a large variety of ways. Below is an example of how magnetism can be created. The arrows represent the direction of the magnetic field along the field lines. This concept is the basis for much of our (6*) technology.

    As a current passes through the coils, it induces a magnetic field from the charges flowing along the wires. Coils are often stacked as shown to amplify the effect and create much stronger magnetic fields. An important piece of technology that uses this effect is a Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) machine which is used in the medical field.