Kohei Yamagami

A fridge magnet holds on thanks to tiny internal arrows: each one like a miniature compass. If you hit the metal with an ultrashort flash of light, these arrows start to jitter chaotically, and magnetism melts away in a millionth of a billionth of a second. Previously, such 'melting' was too fast to observe.

A thin film of a complex oxide is like a transfer tattoo: you need to carefully peel it off one surface and stick it onto another without tearing it. Previously, water-soluble layers were used for this, but they either dissolved too slowly or damaged the film itself. Now a new 'glue' has been proposed: barium oxide. It disappears in water within minutes, leaving the film intact.