{"id":78,"date":"2015-05-14T18:35:28","date_gmt":"2015-05-14T18:35:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/?p=78"},"modified":"2022-03-12T15:36:16","modified_gmt":"2022-03-12T20:36:16","slug":"what-are-ferrofluids","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/2015\/05\/14\/what-are-ferrofluids\/","title":{"rendered":"What are Ferrofluids?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Image of ferrofluids is from Prof. Markus Zahn group at MIT.<\/em><\/p>\n

Ferrofluids (sometimes referred as magnetic liquids) are colloidal suspensions of magnetic nanoparticles. They were originally invented independently around the same time in the early 1960s at NASA Lewis Laboratories, and aslo by Dr. R. E. Rosensweig et al<\/em>. at AVCO Space Systems. Typically, particles within such colloidal suspension are about 10 nanometers (nm) in diameter and suspended in either water or oil.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\"ferrofluiddrawing\"<\/a>Magnetic nanoparticles with surfactants (Ferrotec<\/a><\/span>)<\/div>\n
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There are a variety of ways in which nanometer-sized magnetic particles (for example, iron oxide) can be synthesized. One such straightforward reaction is the coprecipitation of magnetite with ammonia out of iron solutions:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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2FeCl3 + FeCl2 + 8NH3+ 4H2O \u2192 Fe3O4 + 8NH4Cl<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Under normal circumstances, a suspension of magnetic nanoparticles is not necessarily stable on its own. Magnetic attraction between the particles, combined with Van der Waal’s forces, will result in quick agglomeration and settling of the magnetic phase. In order to prevent the particles from coming too close to each other, various surfactants have been used for different liquid carriers. Once particles are prevented from sticking to each other, the colloidal suspension may be stabilized, provided that external forces, such as gravity, do not settle them down. Fortunately, at an average diameter of 10 nm, the magnetic nanoparticles have enough kinetic energy at room temperature to overcome gravity and can be uniformly distributed within their liquid medium.<\/p>\n

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Why do we care about ferrofluids?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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If there is interest to a particular topic in scientific and engineering research, it means that there are plenty of potential industrial or healthcare applications that give the research effort a commercial significance. This is also the case for research in ferrofluids.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Existing Applications<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Below are several examples of ferrofluids applications.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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(1) Liquid seals and bearings<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Ferrofluids can be held in place simply via permanent magnets. This, in turn, enables their use as low-friction liquid seals against pressure differences (in turbo-pumps, for instance). They also act as highly efficient liquid bearings. (Ferrotec)<\/p>\n

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(2) Better loudspeakers<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Ferrofluids are also utilized in loudspeakers to enable enhanced thermal contact (for cooling) and better damping for the voice coils. Over 50 million loudspeakers sold in the US each year use ferrofluids in this context. (Ferrotec)<\/p>\n

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(3) Cellular imaging<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Magnetic nanoparticles functionalized with specific receptors or antibodies are used as contrast agents in transmission electron microscopy (TEM) studies of individual cells. Particles within the cells (as shown in the picture on the left) are taken up typically within small vesicles in a process called endocytosis. Source: Europhysics News (2003) Vol. 34, No. 6.<\/div>\n

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(4) MRI contrast agents<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Functionalized magnetic nanoparticles can also be used as contrast agents in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Seen here as bright spots are the major lymph nodes in mice — such visualization could help in earlier and accurate diagnosis of cancer. Source: Kobayashi, et. al., Cancer Research (63), p. 271-276, 2003.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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More information on ferrofluids –<\/p>\n

Introductions to ferrofluids:<\/p>\n

[1] Wikipedia – Ferrofluids<\/a><\/p>\n

[2] University of Wisconsin – Exploring the Nano World – Ferrofluids<\/a><\/p>\n

[3] Ferrofluid Art by Sachiko Kodama<\/a><\/p>\n

[4] A Guide from Yale (Dr. Hur Koser’s Lab) on How to Make Ferrofluids<\/a><\/p>\n

[5] MIT (Dr. Markus Zahn) Explores Ferrofluid Applications<\/a><\/p>\n

Review paper on ferrofluids:<\/span><\/p>\n

[1] Recent progress in magnetic fluid research – Dr. Stefan Odenbach<\/a><\/p>\n

[2] Magnetic fluid rheology and flows – Dr. Markus Zahn<\/a><\/p>\n

[3] Trends of magnetic fluid applications in Japan – Dr. Nakatsuka<\/a><\/p>\n

[4] Applications of magnetic nanoparticles in biomedicine – Dr. Pankhurst<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

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Research groups working on ferrofluids:<\/p>\n

1. Yale, Koser’s group<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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2. MIT, Dr. Markus Zahn’s group<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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3. University of Dresden, Dr. Stefan Odenbach’s group<\/a><\/p>\n

4. Duke, Dr. Benjamin Yellen’s group<\/a><\/p>\n

5. Drexel University, Dr. Gary Friedman’s group<\/a><\/p>\n

6. MIT, Dr. Alan Hatton’s group<\/a><\/p>\n

7. NTU, Dr. N. T. Nguyen’s group<\/a><\/p>\n

8. EPFL, Dr. Martinus Gijs’s group<\/a><\/p>\n

9. UPRM, Dr. Carlos Rinaldi’s group<\/a><\/p>\n

10. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Dr. Mark I. Shliomis’s group<\/a><\/p>\n

11. Universit\u00e4t Bayreuth, Dr. Reinhard Richter’s group<\/a><\/p>\n

12. Universit\u00e4t T\u00fcbingen, Dr. Mario Liu’s group<\/a><\/p>\n

13. Harvard, Dr. Mara Prentiss’s group<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Image of ferrofluids is from Prof. Markus Zahn group at MIT. Ferrofluids (sometimes referred as magnetic liquids) are colloidal suspensions of magnetic nanoparticles. They were…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,27],"tags":[11,10,22,18],"class_list":["post-78","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ferrofluids","category-research-notes","tag-ferrofluids","tag-magnetism","tag-nanoparticles","tag-nanotechnology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":397,"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78\/revisions\/397"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magnet.engr.uga.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}