Contactless Bending

Using electromagnetism, researchers are bending and shaping soft liquid wires even against gravity. The team used galinstan — an alloy of gallium, indium, and tin that remains liquid at room temperature. On its own, galinstan has a high surface tension and forms droplets. But with a voltage applied, that surface tension is suppressed, making the liquid form a long, thin, still-liquid wire. Adding a magnetic field allowed the researchers to manipulate the falling stream of liquid, even levitating loops of the metal against the force of gravity! (Image, video, and research credit: Y. He et al.; via Cosmos; submitted by Kam-Yung Soh)