Current state of magnetic levitation and its applications in polymers: A review

Magnetic levitation (MagLev) is one of the novel methods that attracts attention from researchers all over the world. It is an accurate and sensitive density testing method that can have applications in the fields of manipulation of particles and cells, chemistry, materials science, and biochemistry, etc. This review mainly focuses on the theory and development of the MagLev method and its applications to polymers. The review covers the most relevant papers on the theory of MagLev methods that established the model to explain the principle of MagLev and the condition for stable levitation. A thorough review on the improvements showed the applications and potential of the MagLev method in many fields. In the summary of the applications to polymers, this review covers the achievements of the MagLev method in two significant directions: chemical sensing for microspheres, biopolymers, and reactions in polymer science, and detection of raw materials and non-destructive testing in polymer engineering. The conclusions highlight the advantages and potentials of the MagLev method. Several future developments are proposed, mainly in improving and broadening the applications of MagLev as a novel test method, especially for application to polymers.