25-06-2011, 09:28 AM
ABSTRACT
Maglev are high-speed trains running in Japan and Germany. The speed of a normal Indian trains is much less than 60 km/hour, where as a maglev train is expected to go as fast as 400 km/hour! This will revolutionize the way people travel, in the near future. Maglev stands for magnetic levitation. Maglev trains function on the principles of magnets. Any magnet has two poles : the north pole and the south pole. Two like poles attract each other and two unlike poles repel each other. This means that when two magnets are brought close together, and if their N poles face each other, the magnets will be repelled. On the other hand if the N pole of one magnet is brought close to the S pole of the second magnet, the two magnets will get attracted together.
When a magnet is kept at one place, it influences its surrounding. If you take a bar magnet on a piece of paper and sprinkle some iron filings, you will notice that the iron filings form a particular pattern around the magnet. The pattern is called the magnetic lines of force. The effect the magnet has around its surrounding is called the magnetic field.