Designing Magnetic Manipulation at the Nanoscale by Amal El-Ghazaly

Magnetism is capable of manipulation of objects both large and small, near and far, visible and invisible. This talk will focus on two ways in which magnetic devices are being developed for manipulation. More specifically, I will present two examples in which we are using magnetism to design versatile devices with applications to haptics (manipulating tactile surfaces) and communications (manipulating electromagnetic waves). First, we will consider what magnetic features are required to make reconfigurable haptic interfaces, capable of giving the user the sensation that they are feeling what they are seeing on a visual display; and reconfigurable communication systems, capable of tuning their frequency of operation real-time. Here, I will present our self-assembled magnetic nanostructures with large magnetic moment and anisotropy as a potential solution to both applications. For haptic interfaces, true 3D fidelity in a tactile display requires extremely flexible materials that can also be programmed real-time to physically illustrate what is visually displayed on the screen. I will present how our magnetic elastomer composites can be used to achieve such fidelity. For microwave communication systems, high frequency resonances need to be widely tunable to enable adaptive filtering and more interference-resilient communications. I will present how our high magnetic anisotropy materials can provide adaptability of such sharp filters at frequencies in the tens of gigahertz. The projects discussed will illustrate the impact of magnetism on the design of broadly versatile devices to ameliorate both technology and society in the future. Scott Hall 6142, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States