Future Files:Don't Call It Anti-Gravity
Posted On: 12 May 2005 By: Jay Oatway Filed Under: Escape From Earth | Flying Car | Future-Stuff-That-Goes-Ping | Jump the Shark
Hacks! The Guardian should know better than to use the term "anti-gravity" in their recent article How to float like a stone. While the technology they discuss portends a breakthrough in "gravity shielding", it does not demonstrate any new physics–like actually finding a gravity particle or its opposite, the anti-gravity particle:
The device exploits diamagnetism. Place non-magnetic objects inside a strong enough magnetic field and they are forced to act like weak magnets themselves. Generate a field that is stronger below and weaker above, and the resulting upward magnetic force cancels out gravity. Scientists have used diamagnetism to make wood, strawberries and, famously, a living frog fly. "That force is strong enough to float things with a density similar to water, but not things with the density of rocks," Prof King said. To make their machine more powerful, the team added an oxygen and nitrogen mixture, a paramagnetic fluid. Inside the magnet, the mixture helps objects to float.
Pics and Video The future is up in the air.
