Magnetic levitation — bismuth's ability to seemingly float between two magnets — is perhaps one of the most interesting.

"Basically a motor is two magnets and a wire that passes between that magnetic field," explains Keane. "Right now the shape of a motor is controlled by the windings and the discrete magnets you ...

Says Shkolnik, "We used the power estimates to calculate magnetic field strengths for the planets using a theory for how the planets' magnetic fields interact with the stellar magnetic fields." ...