How is an electromagnet formed? How does winding the wire around a hard core make the electromagnet stronger?
kjcdb8er Teacher eNotes Editor An electromagnet is formed because of the relationship between electricity and magnetism. When an electric field is in motion, a magnetic field is induced. (Vice versa, when a magnetic field is in motion, an electric field is induced. This is how electrical generators work.) The magnetic field around a wire looks like circles centered on the wire, at every point along the wire. So if you bend that wire into a loop, all of a sudden all these circles start passing through the middle of the loop; the magnetic field is concentrated in one area. Now if you “wind” the wire so that you have one loop after another, the magnetic field continues to be concentrated in the center of the solenoid (the winding) along the whole length of the wire. The magnetic field has to pass through space to complete it’s circuit. The ability of the magnetic field to pass through a material depends on its magnetic susseptability. A magnetic field passes through air just fine, but fer
