A team of researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has made a groundbreaking discovery that defies some long-held expectations in physics. Led by graduate student Anthony Raykh, they created a mixture of oil, water, and magnetized particles that separates into a curved shape when shaken, contradicting the laws of thermodynamics.
The team, including senior authors Thomas Russell and David Hoagland, was initially baffled by the phenomenon but eventually discovered that strong magnetism explains its occurrence. They used simulations to analyze the behavior of individual nanoparticles and found that the particles’ assembly actually increases the interfacial tension between oil and water, causing them to bend into a curved shape.
This “shape-recovering liquid” has potential applications in soft-matter physics, although no specific uses have been identified yet. The research was funded by the National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy.
Source: https://www.umass.edu/news/article/umass-amherst-team-finds-exception-laws-thermodynamics