"You know it aint fiction, just a natural fact. We come together cuz opposites attract." - Prof. Abdul - 1989

The team also found that they could achieve the same loss of order by turning on quantum mechanics with an electromagnet containing the salt. Thus, physicists now have a new toy, a collection of tiny bar magnets, which naturally assume an antiferromagnetic configuration and for which they can dial in quantum mechanics at will.

Huh?

- "What're quantum mechanics?"
- "I don't know. People who repair quantums, I suppose."

-- (Terry Pratchett, Eric)

I don't want to hear it from no scientist

Scientists have managed to switch on and off the magnetism of a new material using quantum mechanics,

You keep using those words, but I don't think you know what it means.

Yeah, this sounds interesting but I'm not convinced that the person writing the article actually knows what these scientists did.

/I sure don't.

I haven't time to check into the paper itself which I'm sure would be far more interesting, but what the article describes is hardly something new. Salts, with their inherently ionic nature, easily display magnetism given the right conditions, magnetism itself being related to quantum mechanics. Not sure what the point of this write-up was.

/Materials engineer
//Knowledge comes in handy every once in awhile

RoyBatty: The team also found that they could achieve the same loss of order by turning on quantum mechanics with an electromagnet containing the salt...

Huh?

Look, QM is hard-- right?

I suggest we all just turn it off and then we can all go back to classical mechanics.

NOBODY TURN IT BACK ON!

Magnetism has been predicted to occur in
systems in which dipolar interactions dominate
exchange. We present neutron scattering,
specific heat, and magnetic susceptibility data
for LiErF 4, establishing it as a model dipolar-
coupled antiferromagnet with planar spin-
anisotropy and a quantum phase transition in
applied field H c|| = 4.0 ± 0.1 kilo-oersteds. We
discovered non-mean-field critical scaling for
the classical phase transition at the
antiferromagnetic transition temperature that
is consistent with the two-dimensional XY/h 4
universality class; in accord with this, the
quantum phase transition at H c exhibits three-
dimensional classical behavior. The effective
dimensional reduction may be a consequence
of the intrinsic frustrated nature of the dipolar
interaction, which strengthens the role of
fluctuations.
Mesa cause one, two-y little bitty axadentes, huh?
Yud say boom de gasser, den crashin der bosses heyblibber, den banished.

THATS GREAT. Now what is the magnetic field.

Tainted1: THATS GREAT. Now what is the magnetic field.

`
it's a model dipolar-coupled antiferromagnet with planar spin-anisotropy and a quantum phase transition in applied field H c|| = 4.0 ± 0.1 kilo-oersteds.

Great, now I can make my magnet engine, just needed a way to turn magnetism on and off next to a piston with a magnet on it...

RandomAxe: dready zim: Great, now I can make my magnet engine, just needed a way to turn magnetism on and off next to a piston with a magnet on it...

If it were that easy, you wouldn't need the engine, because you could make an A/C electric generator directly.

But probably, at that scale, you'd use more energy funking up the magnetic field than you'd generate with your engine / motor / generator.

The semi-near-term practical applications of this may lie in electromagnetic valves / gates for plasma systems, or something.

For all intents an purposes they already have these, they're called electric motors ;)