{"id":20225,"date":"2025-11-11T10:42:50","date_gmt":"2025-11-11T05:12:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=20225"},"modified":"2025-11-11T16:39:43","modified_gmt":"2025-11-11T11:09:43","slug":"what-are-altermagnets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/what-are-altermagnets\/","title":{"rendered":"Altermagnets"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><b>Altermagnetism Latest News<\/b><\/h2>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The discovery of altermagnetism represents a step forward in physicists\u2019 understanding of the magnetic world.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>What is Ferromagnetism and Antiferromagnetism?<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Magnetism has long been categorised into two primary types: ferromagnetism and antiferromagnetism.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Ferromagnetism <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">is<\/span><b> responsible for the behaviour of materials like iron and nickel<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, where <\/span><b>all magnetic moments align in the same direction, producing strong magnetisation<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> \u2013 such as the force that makes fridge magnets stick.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Antiferromagnetism <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">occurs when<\/span><b> magnetic moments align in a regular pattern but point in opposite directions, cancelling each other out <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and resulting in <\/span><b>no external magnetic field.<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>About Altermagnetism<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Altermagnetism is a type of magnetism where <\/span><b>magnetic moments<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (tiny magnetic fields created by electrons<\/span><b>) align in opposite directions but follow a distinct rotated pattern.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This <\/span><b>unique arrangement<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> creates properties that <\/span><b>combine key elements of both ferromagnets and antiferromagnets.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Like antiferromagnets, altermagnets have magnetic moment<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s that <\/span><b>align in opposite directions, cancelling out any overall magnetisation.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">However, <\/span><b>like ferromagnets, <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">altermagnets still <\/span><b>allow spin-polarised currents.<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> In ferromagnets, spin-polarised currents can only occur because all electron spins or moments align in one direction (producing a <a href=\"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/upsc-exam\/electricity-and-magnetism\/\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>magnetic field<\/strong><\/a>).<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The <\/span><b>key distinction in altermagnets is that the larger, crystal-like structures holding these magnetic moments are rotated relative to each other, creating distinct electronic behaviours.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>It is the rotation of these larger structures that allows for spin-polarised currents <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">to still occur in altermagnets.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This makes <\/span><b>altermagnets <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">potentially valuable for a<\/span><b> variety of applications, particularly in electronics and data storage. <\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400; text-align: justify;\" aria-level=\"1\">They <b style=\"font-size: inherit;\">eliminate the possibility of stray magnetic fields<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> while <\/span><b style=\"font-size: inherit;\">still allowing for a spin-polarised current \u2013<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> a highly useful combination for modern electronics.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/sci-tech\/science\/altermagnetism-emerges-as-a-new-class-of-magnetic-order-what-is-it\/article70261367.ece\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">TH<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Altermagnetism is a type of magnetism where magnetic moments (tiny magnetic fields created by electrons) align in opposite directions but follow a distinct rotated pattern. Read more about Altermagnets, Uses, Properties, Altramagnetism, Latest News.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":52903,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[300,246,21,23],"class_list":{"0":"post-20225","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"tag-altermagnets","9":"tag-prelims-current-affairs","10":"tag-prelims-pointers","11":"tag-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","12":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20225"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20225\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52903"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}