Kotaro HondaDied 12 Feb 1954 (born Feb 1870).Japanese metallurgist whose studies of the metallurgy or iron and steel led to the invention of powerful magnetic steels including KS Magnetic Steel (1917) and New KS Magnetic Steel (1933) containing iron, aluminum, nickel, cobalt, copper and titanium.. (KS stands for Kichizaemon Sumitomo, who provided financial support for the research.) Honda investigated magnetic substances, and following research (1926-35) on the magnetization of single crystals of iron, cobalt and nickel, he discovered how to make anisotropic magnets. These have their magnetic domains locked in one particular direction during manufacture, resulting in being able to be magnetised only along this axis. Because all their magnetic domains are aligned in the same direction, anisotropic magnets are much stronger than isotropic magnets.« |
