Tokyo researchers created the strongest controllable magnetic field in history

Tokyo researchers created the strongest controllable magnetic field in history(motherboard.vice.com)

80 points by kulu2002 7 years ago | 32 comments

camtarn 7 years ago |

Anti-clickbait: they didn't blow up their lab, just blew the doors off an iron enclosure intended to contain the massive shockwave, which turned out to be even more massive than intended. Still impressive though!

SketchySeaBeast 7 years ago | |

> just blew the doors off an iron enclosure intended to contain the massive magnetic field

Now, I'm by no means a physicists, but aren't iron enclosures particularly bad at containing magnetic fields?

CompelTechnic 7 years ago | | |

From a tiny bit of experience, I know that industrial electromagnets (think of the ones they use to pick up steel at a scrap yard) often have an iron/steel housing that is used as a "return path" for the field. The front face of the magnet has a field that projects out into the air, but the field on the back face gets channeled into the housing.

cuboidGoat 7 years ago | | |

The magnetic field will tend to concentrate in the iron, meaning it shouldn't propagate as far.

Same as using Mu metal for magnetic shielding - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mu-metal

bitexploder 7 years ago | | |

It had a lot of holes, maybe that has something to do with it. Looked like a giant microwave door screen.

contravariant 7 years ago | | |

Well you're going to need something that reacts to magnetic fields in some way. In that sense iron isn't an odd choice.

Anything that isn't susceptible to magnetic fields is not going to do much, even if its conductive that can only help against brief bursts.

empath75 7 years ago | | |

the iron enclosure was meant to contain the explosion not the field.

bennyelv 7 years ago | |

I was waiting for Gordon Freeman to emerge from behind the machine with his crowbar...

DiabloD3 7 years ago | | |

Wouldn't that be a red letter day.

CardenB 7 years ago | | |

Half life 3 confirmed

jandrese 7 years ago |

It blows my mind that we can compress a magnetic field with chemical explosives. I wouldn't have expected them to interact much at all.

phkahler 7 years ago | |

>> I wouldn't have expected them to interact much at all.

They don't interact directly:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Explosively_pumped_flux_compre...

piyh 7 years ago | | |

This is the link I was looking for in the comments, thanks.

bhousel 7 years ago |

I'm kind of amazed they were even able to record a video in a 1200 Tesla magnetic field.

d-sc 7 years ago | |

Magnetic fields tend to decay with distance from the source which helps.

etiam 7 years ago | | |

And broadly speaking by the cube of the distance from the source apparently. But in this case it decays from a mind-boggling starting level by everyday life standards. If that camera is 5 meters away from the source the field there is still about 10 Tesla. I think that's about an order of magnitude more than most MRI machines for clinical purposes, and those already warrant a good deal of care with effects on metals.

rhcom2 7 years ago |

Reminds me of the scene at the end of Real Genius when they get their laser chemical laser to finally work and it puts a hole through the building.

tomkat0789 7 years ago |

Could you put a machine (that wasn't powered by TNT or something equally crazy) into a space ship for protection from cosmic rays? Is that something people are looking into?

scrumbledober 7 years ago | |

I don't have a source on hand but I have read some study that theorized a very powerful electromagnet in a mars-sun lagrange point could be used to create a magnetic field to shield mars from cosmic radiation in a similar way to earth's magnetosphere. I seem to remember the power needed being (obviously) very large but surprisingly not many orders of magnitude out of plausibility. For a much smaller entity than a planet (spaceship) it may be possible with a low enough power consumption to make it possible. I would imagine there would be many many engineering concerns with having such a high powered magnet in your spaceship though.

calebm 7 years ago |

I think the most likely doomsday scenario involves this type of weapon.

mrhackerpoland 7 years ago |

Now my question is, can it damage SSD? Or interfere with my wifi?

Is it strong enough to alter my brain?

forgot-my-pw 7 years ago | |

Some examples of Tesla unit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_(unit)#Examples & https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orders_of_magnitude_(magnetic_...

8 T – the strength of LHC magnets

11.75 T – the strength of INUMAC magnets, largest MRI scanner

16 T – magnetic field strength required to levitate a frog

17.6 T – strongest field trapped in a superconductor in a lab as of July 2014

35.4 T – the current (2009) world record for a superconducting electromagnet in a background magnetic field

45 T – the current (2015) world record for continuous field magnets

100 T - Strongest pulsed non-destructive magnetic field produced in a laboratory

1200 T - Record for indoor pulsed magnetic field, (University of Tokyo, 2018)

2800 T - Record for human produced, pulsed magnetic field, (VNIIEF, 2001)

1 MT - 100 MT - Strength of a neutron star

ChuckMcM 7 years ago | | |

Wow, 2800T is .28% of a neutron star? That is pretty impressive.

cuboidGoat 7 years ago |

Vice really needs to hire some proofreaders.

justtopost 7 years ago | |

I hate when I see a sciency article from them. They are great with human interest stuff (if you like their spin) but the technical stuff is always lacking. You can tell where the writer hits their wall of undertanding and tries to fill it with quotes instead of working with someone knowlegable on the subject.