magnetism

Magnetic silverware in restaurants

October 2, 2008

Regarding magnetic “silverware” in restaurants from NPR’s Car talk (week of 9/22) PUZZLER: A Magnetizing Dinner Chez Magliozzi Over dinner, Ray’s wife notices that her knife and fork are stuck to each other, her knife was magnetized. Ray’s son’s knife was magnetized too, but the polarity was the reverse of her’s. Ray’s niece offers an [...]

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How do we teach our physics majors?

July 22, 2008

[[AAPT SESSION: TRANSFORMING UPPER-DIVISION E&M I]] This post is primarily for college physics teachers. Hey, if you’re ever presiding over a conference session, here’s a tip for you. If one of your presenters has technical issues, don’t give her a hard time after the talk is over, even in jest, about having gone over time. [...]

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Ferrofluid

December 20, 2007

I just realized I haven’t yet written about ferrofluid… I was mentioning it to a few folks last night over dinner (no, dinner with me isn’t as geeky as I’d generally like) and they hadn’t heard of it. Ferrofluid is a thick oil with tiny suspended particles of iron (magnetite) in it. That means that [...]

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