MAGNETIC

MCP, PH121
MATERIALS
Ridhima Gahrotra
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 INTRODUCTION
• The phenomenon of magnetism is the one by which a material exerts either attractive or
repulsive force on another. The fundamental source of magnetism is the rotation of
electrically charged particles. Thus magnetic behavior of a material can be drawn from the
structure of atoms.
• The electrons in atoms rotate around the nucleus in circular orbits. This orbital motion
and its own spin cause magnetic moments on the atoms, which contribute to the magnetic
behavior of materials.
• Thus every material can respond to a magnetic field. However, the manner in which a
material responds depends much upon its atomic structure, and determines whether the
material will have strong or weak magnetic properties.

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• Iron, some steels, and the naturally occurring mineral lodestone are well
known examples of materials that exhibit magnetic properties.

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• Magnetic Dipoles
Magnetic dipoles are found to exist in magnetic materials, like the electric dipoles. A
magnetic dipole is a small magnet composed of north and south poles instead of positive
and negative charges.

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• Magnetic Field Strength
The magnetic field strength is the externally applied magnetic field denoted by H. The
magnetic field generated by means of a cylindrical coil (or solenoid) consisting of N
closely spaced turns, having a length l and carrying a current i is given by.

The units of H are ampere-turns per meter, or just amperes per meter.
• Intensity of Magnetisation (I)
It is defined as the magnetic moment per unit volume of the magnetized substance

• Magnetic Susceptibility (χm)

It is the ratio of the magnetic moment per unit volume (I) to the magnetic field strength (H)
of the magnetizing field.

It is positive for a paramagnetic material and negative for a diamagnetics.

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• Relative Permeability (µr)
It is the ratio of the magnetic permeability (µ) of the substance to thepermeability of the free
space (µ0).

• Magnetic Flux Density

The magnetic induction, or magnetic flux density, denoted by B, represents the
magnitude of the internal field strength within a substance that is subjected to an H
field. The units for B are tesla or weber per square meter. Both B and H are magnetic
field vectors. The relation between magnetic field strength and flux density is given by
B = H, Where
is the permeability of a material which is a measure of the degree to which the material
can be magnetized, or the ease with which a magnetic field (B) can be induced in the
presence of an external field H. The magneticflux density due to magnetization in
material can be written as below
B=

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• Classification of Magnetism
Magnetic materials can be classified mainly into three categories namely diamagnetic,
paramagnetic and ferromagnetic.

MCP, PH121 Ferromagnetic

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 Paramagnetic Materials Diamagnetic Materials Ferromagnetic Materials
These materials have Very small These materials have Very small These materials have positive
but positive magnetic but negative susceptibility and large magnetic susceptibility
susceptibility (~10 )
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(~ 10-6) (~106)
The relative permeability is µr is slightly less than unity The µr for a ferromagnetic
slightly more than unity (µr˃1) (µr˂1)(-ve) material is of the order of few
thousands
The magnetic susceptibility The magnetic susceptibility of The magnetic susceptibility
depends strongly on temperature diamagnetic materials is almost decreases with increase in
and varies inversely with independent of temperature temperature
temperature

When a bar of a paramagnetic When a bar of these materials is When a bar of these materials is
material is suspended between suspended between the poles of suspended between the poles of
the poles of a magnet, it stays a magnet, it stays perpendicular a magnet, it behaves like a
parallel to the lines of force. to the magnetic field paramagnetic material

If these materials are placed in a If these materials are placed in a These materials behave like
non-uniform field, they are non-uniform field, they are Paramagnetic substances, if
attracted towards the stronger attracted towards the weaker placed in a non uniform field
field field
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• CLASSICAL THEORY OF FERROMAGNETISM

• Ferromagnetic materials show spontaneous magnetization due to internal field arising

as a result of mutual interactions between magnetic domains. When placed in external
magnetic field they acquire very large and permanent magnetization in the direction of
applied field.
• Each atom of ferromagnetic material has a permanent magnetic moment like the
paramagnetic substances.
• In general, a specimen of a ferromagnetic substance contains a number of small
regions called domains.
• These domains are typically very small (about 50 μm) or less and contain a large
number of atoms, nearly 1017 to 1022, and have the dimensions of about 10-6 cm3 to
10-2cm3.
• Each domain consists of magnetic moments that are aligned, giving rise to a
permanent net magnetic moment per domain.
• Each of these domains is separated from the rest by domain boundaries called Bloch
walls which are about 100 nm thick.
• Domains exist even in the absence of external field. In a material that has never been
exposed to a magnetic field, the individual domains have a random orientation. This
type of arrangement represents the lowest free energy.
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•When the bulk material is unmagnetized (no external magnetic field is applied), the net
magnetization of these domains is zero, because adjacent domains are orientated randomly
in any direction, effectively canceling each other’s out figure (a).
•When a magnetic field is applied on the material, domains that are nearly lined up with
the field (favourable domains) grow at the expense of unaligned domains figure (b).
•The Bloch walls move, the external field provides the force required for this movement
and this process continues until only the most favorably oriented domains remains.
•When the domain growth is completed, a further increase in the magnetic field causes the
domains to rotate and align parallel to the applied field figure (c).
•At this instant material reaches saturation magnetization and no further increase in
magnetizationwill take place on increasing the strength of the external field.
•Under these conditions the permeability of these materials becomes quite small. The
variation of magnetization with applied magnetic field H is shown is figure below.

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Materials with ferro-magnetism (e.g. Fe, Co, Ni, Gd) possess magnetic susceptibilities ~
106. Above the Curie temperature, ferro-magnetic materials behave as para-magnetic
materials and their susceptibility is given by the Curie-Weiss law, defined as

Where C is the Curie constant, T being temperature and Tc is called Curie temperature.

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• Antiferromagnetism: In anti ferromagnetic materials the magnetic moments of
neighboring electrons point in opposite direction. Therefore, it has zero net magnetic
moment.  In these materials the alignment of  magnetic movement of the atoms are
combinations of both parallel and anti parallel.
• Ferrimagnetism: In ferrimagnetic materials, the opposing moments are unequal and a
spontaneous magnetization remains.

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Variation of Susceptibility with temperature

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• Magnetic Hysteresis
The magnetization behaviour of the ferromagnetic materials is described by the B-H curve
(hysteresis loop) as shown in figure.

(i) Retentivity - It is the ability of a material' to retain a certain amount of residual

magnetic field when the magnetizing force is removed after achieving saturation.
(ii) Coercive force (field) - The amount of reverse magnetic field which mustbe applied to
a magnetic material to make the magnetic flux inside the material to return tozero.
(iii) Permeability - A property of a material that describes the ease withwhich a magnetic
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• Energy Loss Due to Hysteresis
During the process of magnetization and demagnetization, a loss of energy is always
involved in aligning the domains (motion of domain walls and rotation of dipoles) in the
direction of the applied magnetic field. When the direction of an external magnetic field
is reversed, the absorbed energy is not completely recovered and rest energy in sample is
lost in the form of heat. This loss of energy is called hysteresis loss.
• Calculation of Hysteresis Loss
It can be proved that the energy lost per unit volume of the substance in a complete cycle
ofmagnetization is equal to the area of the hysteresis loop. We consider a unit volume of
the ferromagnetic substance, which has N magnetic domains. Let M be the magnetic
moment of each magnetic domain which makes an angle θ with the direction of the
magnetic field H.
So, the total magnetic moment per unit volume in the direction of magnetizing field

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TYPES OF MAGNETIC MATERIALS

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 INTRODUCTION TO NANOMATERIALS
A nanometer is one millionth of a millimeter - approximately 100,000 times smaller than the
diameter of a human hair [1].

Nano dwarf Small objects

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 SUPERPARAMAGNETISM

The Magnetic Nano Particles (MNPs) might be considered to be composed of a single

magnetic domain if its size decreses below a critical level.
It might display a superparamagnetic behaviour as long as the temperature is above a
particular temperature which is called Blocking Temperature.
MNPs possess large magnetic moment that changes orientation continuously.
At temperatures below, magnetic moments of the nanoparticles freeze in random
orientations.

Blocked and unblocked states in superparamagnetic materials

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The magnetization curve of superparamagnetic materials is not defined by a hysteresis curve
as observed for the ferromagnetic materials. The curve is reversible with no remanent
magnetization and no coercivity.

B-H curve of superparamagnetic materials Comparison among M-H curves of paramagnetic,

ferromagnetic and superparamagnetic materials

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Time for Assignment Questions (5 min)

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