[Editors] MIT adds artistic spin to study of electromagnetism

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MIT adds artistic spin to study of electromagnetism
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For Immediate Release
THURSDAY, MAR. 11, 2004
Contact: Elizabeth A. Thomson, MIT News Office
Phone: 617-258-5402
Email: thomson at mit.edu

--PHOTOS AVAILABLE: go to 
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/tt/2004/mar03/weirdfields.html to 
preview--

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--The winning images in MIT’s first annual "Weird 
Fields" contest are not only beautiful but also educational, helping 
their creators understand the abstract phenomena they're learning about 
in the course from which the contest originated.

What's more, students from around the world can also learn from this 
approach, since the course materials--and the computer program involved 
in the contest--are available free through MIT's OpenCourseWare 
initiative (http://ocw.mit.edu).

It's easy to directly experience and therefore get a rough 
understanding of gravity--we've all dropped things--but what about 
electromagnetic forces? They're just as important. "The material object 
presenting this text does not fall through the floor to the center of 
the Earth because it is floating on (and held together by) 
electrostatic force fields," says the overview for 8.02, or 
Electromagnetism I. "Electromagnetic forces quite literally dominate 
our everyday experience … However, we are unaware of this in a visceral 
way, in large part because [they] are enormously stronger than 
gravity."

In addition, the vectors, or flow fields, that physicists use to 
describe these forces are very abstract. Picture the jet stream as 
shown on a weather map complete with the abundant little arrows. At 
every point, the jet stream has velocities in a different direction. 
The arrows represent those different directions, or wind vectors.

"The same is true for electromagnetism," said Professor of Physics John 
Belcher, who teaches 8.02. But how do you share those concepts with 
students? "They have trouble visualizing what vector fields look like," 
he said.

So Belcher and colleagues at the MIT Center for Educational Computer 
Initiatives developed a computer applet into which students put the 
mathematical expressions that describe a given field. "It then pops out 
what the field will look like," he said.

Enter the "Weird Fields" contest, which encourages students to explore 
vectors by playing with the applet. "It allows them to construct fields 
themselves and get some feeling for why they look like they do," 
Belcher said.

The winner, Nicki Lehrer, and runner-up David Rush will receive framed 
color reproductions of their "weird fields."

For more information about the course and the contest, go to 
http://web.mit.edu/8.02T/www.