magnetic flux

noun

: a measure of magnetic induction represented by lines of force

Examples of magnetic flux in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web These magnetic pairs mostly—but not entirely—dissipate as the sunspots decay away, leaving a little leftover magnetic flux of one charge or the other. Meghan Bartels, Scientific American, 20 Oct. 2023 Scientific instrument maker Bruker’s newest spectrometers sandwich an inner coil of HTS between an outer coil of low-temperature superconductors, achieving magnetic flux densities of 28.2 T—nearly 600,000 times as strong as Earth’s magnetic field. IEEE Spectrum, 18 Sep. 2023 In Polaris, each fusion pulse should cause the plasma to expand, increasing its magnetic flux and inducing electric current in the magnetic coils that ultimately flows back to the capacitors. IEEE Spectrum, 29 June 2023 Electrical circuits use four fundamental variables — current, voltage, charge and magnetic flux-linkage. Steve Volk, Discover Magazine, 1 Mar. 2018 In the ‘70s, scientists observed that magnetic flux around a tiny doughnut of a superconductor behaved this way. Sumeet Kulkarni, Los Angeles Times, 2 July 2022 His research led to the question of tangles, which also occur at the microscopic level in DNA helixes and in magnetic flux lines crisscrossing the cosmos. Douglas Belkin, WSJ, 2 May 2022 If the spectral gap ever dropped below a critical value as scientists inserted more and more magnetic flux, QAC would happily allow the system to jump to a new, excited quantum state, leaving behind its low-energy past. Spyridon Michalakis, Scientific American, 1 Aug. 2020 Laughlin's original argument used this notion to mathematically model the quantum Hall effect as the adiabatic evolution of the electronic state of a quantum Hall system under the increase of a fictitious magnetic flux. Spyridon Michalakis, Scientific American, 1 Aug. 2020

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'magnetic flux.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

First Known Use

1896, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of magnetic flux was in 1896

Dictionary Entries Near magnetic flux

Cite this Entry

“Magnetic flux.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/magnetic%20flux. Accessed 25 Apr. 2024.

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