A frog levitating in a strong magnetic field (1997) [video] | Hacker News Reader

A frog levitating in a strong magnetic field (1997) [video]

youtube.com

The failure of the scientific community in not continuing to pursue the goal of levitating increasingly large fauna can not be overstated. It’s 2023 and we’ve devoted untold billions to finding the Higgs boson, to landing and reusing orbital rockets, and yet, I can’t go on YouTube and find a video of a levitating giraffe. Sad.

Agree, it feels like levitating a giraffe has been five years away for the last twenty years. The problem is private industry doesn't have a profit incentive to make the leap until it feels like a sure thing.

Word on the street is that the government has had levitating giraffes (and maybe even bigger creatures) for years but it's all so locked up in the classified world that the tech will never see the light of day.

That's ridiculous, I saw a levitating giraffe just the other day.

What about levitating humans?

A fun fact is that, if memory doesn't fool me, the levitating frog experiment was carried out by Micheal Berry and Andre Geim, and they were awarded the ignobel for it.

Berry is the same one of the Berry phase for which he received a ton of non-humorous awards, and Geim went on to discover graphene and receive a Nobel without the ig in front.

Is Geim the only person so far to receive a Nobel after receiving an Ig Nobel?

Yes (in either order)

Coincidentally, the most recent episode of the BBC podcast 'Discovery', part of their 'Life Scientific' series, is an extended interview with Geim:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w3ct5j21

Ignoring the differences between LK-99 and the levitating frog is foolish. 1. The diamagnetism of LK-99 is more than ten thousand times that of the frog; 2. LK-99 only exhibits one-dimensional diamagnetism, whereas the frog has three-dimensional diamagnetism.

Odds are that anyone equating those two at this point is dishonest.

But I think the video made it here because it's cool as fuck. There is no implication of anything around it.

I can’t figure out if his post was jest or not.

But it's diamagnetism none the less. Which is the entire point of the argument against LK-99.

The researchers claim, to the reporter, that they could achieve the same with a person. Specifically, he said with “no problem” and “technically, we can do it with you without any problem.“

The blurb on the video, from the AP:

“ 12 Apr 1997) English/Nat British and Dutch scientists using a giant magnetic field have made a frog float in mid- air, and might even be able to do the same thing with a human being. The team from Britain's University of Nottingham and the University of Nijmegen in the Netherlands has also succeeded in levitating plants, grasshoppers and fish. Scientists at the University of Nijmegen in Holland have managed to make a frog float six feet (approximately two metres) in the air - and they say the trick could easily be repeated with a human. The secret is not magic but a powerful magnetic field which overcomes the force of gravity. The field makes the frog's atoms generate a weak magnetic force in the opposite direction. This causes it to be repelled in the same way as like poles of two magnets. Plants, grasshoppers and fish have been levitated by the research team in the same way. NASA, apparently, is extremely interested in the experiment in order to be able to test the effects of weightlessness on astronauts without having to put them into space. Easy, says team leader Dr Andre Geim. SOUNDBITE: (English) There is no problem with putting a man by this magnetic levitation, to fly in the air. Technically we can do it with you without any problems. SUPER CAPTION: Dr Andre Geim, Director of the High Field Magnetic Laboratory of the Catholic University of Nijmegen And for those worried about the effects on the frog - don't worry. He's not hopping mad - quite the opposite, in fact.

“

Came across this video in high school when I was doing research on portable MRIs for some club. Really shocked me that this was possible, always have been hopeful to see more research into magnetic fields and what they can do. I remember that superconducting was a challenge, but have read about breakthroughs using graphene since. Hopefully we get to see something in our lifetime

Yes but is it superconducting? /s

Let’s say frogs are proven to be room temperature superconductors. How do we turn them into maglev trains?

Frogs are the new LK-99?

Everyone knows frogs are superconductors. The problem is to run them at high temperatures you have to heat them up very slowly so they don't notice it's happening.

LK99 might just be the discovery of a new way to fool yourself about the meissner effect, flux pinning, etc. Or not! But here's one way. These are exciting times!

Any chance of magnetically repelling a person from a ceiling, and/or attracting them from the floor, to create artificial gravity in space?

Seems like that couldn't possibly be practical. For one thing, it'd be like being in an MRI machine -- no metal of any kind allowed. A field that strong would likely interfere with any instruments or electronics as well, even if they were outside the room within a certain distance.

Much simpler to use constant acceleration (or spinning)...

No. The magnetic field needed increases as the size of the levitated region increases. For something as big as a person the magnetic field would require magnets made of impossibly strong materials to resist the JxB forces.

So you’re saying there’s a way.

I'm not even sure a person could survive being in a magnetic field that strong. Motion of blood through the field would generate electric currents in the brain and heart (and elsewhere).

That sounds like a much more convincing explanation than “we simply don’t have this material”.

Back of the envelope tells me levitating a person would need a magnetic field 10x that of this frog droplet, or about 160 T. The magnetic pressure of a 160 T magnetic field 1.5 million psi, or about 100x the pressure at the bottom on the Marianna Trench, and also about 1/3rd the detonation pressure of military high explosives.

They said that the levitated frog was fine afterward, but I've always wondered about the effects of long-term exposure.

Induced by the hemoglobin movement?

Just motion of salty water in a magnetic field.

Just have them wear clothes made with ferromagnetic material, should have a similar effect.

Not even close but thanks for playing.

You know there's a lot of other stuff around that would have problems with huge multi-tesla fields, right? Even levitating someone with iron attached to various points on a full body rope access harness would require consideration of the wiring in the walls.

Yep. It's a terrible idea.

IANAP, but i would assume such levitation wouldn't be all that stable if we are expecting people to move around in it.

in probably our case, it will rip off our skin and levitate it, meanwhile our flesh false to the ground.

You can, but the cost is the iron in your blood gets pulled out with extremely strong magnetism.

Whatever the second creature was - a grasshopper? Made me too squeamish to continue watching

Hey dumbass, you tryna make me puke?

The frog must have been very confused.

The really impressive part is where the frog turns into a grasshopper. (just combing someone's comment from youtube)

Kek wills it

Reply on news.ycombinator.com