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Magnets and Electromagnets Essay

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Introduction Magnets have existed for hundreds of thousands of years and have been used by many different cultures throughout this time. Magnets have been useful throughout the years because they can hold two things together just through the force of the metal in the magnet. With the world’s constantly changing technology, electromagnets have been evolved from magnets and are more useful than a regular magnet but in order for an electromagnet to work, an electric current needs to be present (http://saxonhomeschool.hmhco.com/ha/Resources/saxonhomeschool/Holt_ST_PhysSci_Samp.pdf). The following questions that need to be addressed when learning about magnets and electromagnets are:
1. What is a magnet?
2. What is the cause of …show more content…

Whether a material is magnetic depends on the material’s atoms” (insert saxon citation). A material’s atoms can effect what different materials that the magnet can pick up. Everything in the universe is made up of atoms and electrons. The electron moves around the atom and as it does this, it creates a magnetic field. In materials such as aluminum and copper, the magnetic fields of those certain atoms delete each other making the materials not magnetic (insert saxon citation). “In materials such as iron, nickel, and cobalt, groups of atoms are in tiny areas called domains. The north and south poles of the atoms in a domain line up and make a strong magnetic field. The arrangement of domains in an object determines whether the object is magnetic or not” (insert saxon citation). Because magnetic materials contain domains, this makes the material magnetic and attract other magnetic objects.

What are the different kinds of magnets? Magnets are made up of many different materials such as “iron, nickel, cobalt, or a mixture of these metals” (insert saxon citation). Ferromagnets are created with those metals and produce strong magnetic properties. “A mineral magnetite is an example of a naturally occurring ferromagnet” from the combination of stronger metals. Another kind of magnet is the electromagnet. This kind of magnet is made from an electric current and an electromagnet consists of an iron core (insert saxon citation). Magnets can also be classified as

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