A touch of gold sends crystals electric with excitement

A touch of gold—or another noble metal—can change the structure of a crystal and its intrinsic properties, physicists at the University of Warwick have demonstrated in a display of modern-day alchemy.

Spin flipper upends protons

Protons spin. It's an intrinsic property that can affect experiments at accelerators that use beams of protons. Yet flipping proton spins could offer insights into nuclear physics experiments that study the first moments ...

Intrinsic properties—the secret lives of accelerometers

When different laboratories test the same accelerometer, such as the one in your smartphone, they often come up with very different values. There are several possible reasons: Perhaps the axes of the gimbal system used in ...

Generation of tailored magnetic materials

New technologies require growing precision in the intrinsic properties of the materials used. To meet increasingly specific requirements, physicists are interested in a generation of artificial materials, the properties of ...

page 1 from 4

Intrinsic and extrinsic properties

The term intrinsic denotes a property of some thing or action which is essential and specific to that thing or action, and which is wholly independent of any other object, action or consequence. A characteristic which is not essential or inherent is extrinsic.

For example in biology, intrinsic effects originate from "inside" an organism or cell, such as an autoimmune disease or intrinsic immunity.

More specific uses of the concepts can be found:

This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA