The Invisible Fire: How 19th-Century Physics Is Revolutionizing the Modern Kitchen

It’s not magic, it’s electromagnetism. Understanding the century-old science behind your induction cooktop reveals a story of genius, efficiency, and elegant engineering.

Step into a high-end modern kitchen, and you might notice something strange. The cooktop is a sheet of cool, black glass. There is no open flame, no glowing red coil. Yet, a pot of water placed upon it erupts into a rolling boil in minutes, faster than any gas range could manage. The air remains cool. The process is unnervingly silent, save for the hum of a small fan and the bubbling of the water itself.

How is this possible? How is intense heat seemingly generated from thin air, right where it’s needed, and nowhere else? The answer lies not in some 21st-century technological wizardry, but in a discovery made nearly 200 years ago in a cluttered London laboratory. The protagonist of this story isn’t a chef or an engineer, but a fundamental force of nature: electromagnetism.

The Spark of Genius: A Ghost in the Wires

Our story begins in 1831, inside the Royal Institution of Great Britain. A self-taught bookbinder’s son named Michael Faraday was conducting a series of deceptively simple experiments. He observed that when he moved a magnet through a coil of copper wire, a tiny electric current would mysteriously appear in that wire, making the needle of his galvanometer twitch. When the magnet stopped, the current vanished.

This was the discovery of electromagnetic induction: a changing magnetic field creates an electric field. It was a monumental revelation, the kind that reshapes our understanding of the universe. It established a deep, hidden connection between magnetism and electricity, two forces previously thought to be distinct. For the first time, humanity understood that energy could be transferred invisibly, across a gap, without any physical contact. The principles Faraday uncovered would eventually lead to the invention of the electric generator and motor, powering the industrial world. But hidden within his discovery was another, more subtle secret—one that would take over a century to find its way to the kitchen countertop.

The Unseen Tempest: Turning Magnetism into Heat

Faraday showed that a moving magnet could create a current in a wire. An induction cooktop does the reverse, but on a far more intense scale. Beneath its glass surface lies a large copper coil. When you turn a burner on, a powerful, high-frequency alternating current is sent through this coil, generating an incredibly dynamic and unstable magnetic field that oscillates back and forth thousands of times per second.

This is where your pot or pan enters the story. When you place a piece of ferromagnetic cookware—meaning it’s made of a material that strongly interacts with magnetic fields, like cast iron or magnetic stainless steel—onto the glass, this oscillating magnetic field penetrates the bottom of the pan.

Imagine the magnetic field as a subatomic paddle, and the free-flowing electrons inside the pan’s metal as a vast, calm sea. The rapidly flipping magnetic field begins to furiously stir this sea of electrons, whipping them into countless microscopic whirlpools of electrical energy. These are called eddy currents.

This silent, invisible tempest of electrons, however, doesn’t flow without resistance. The metal of the pan itself fights back. As the eddy currents swirl against the natural electrical resistance of the cookware, a tremendous amount of friction is generated at the atomic level. This friction is heat. Known as Joule heating, it’s the same principle that makes an old-fashioned light bulb’s filament glow. The critical difference is that here, the “filament” is the bottom of your pan. The cooktop isn’t heating the pan; it’s creating the conditions for the pan to heat itself from within.

This is the beautiful, elegant core of induction cooking. It’s also why only certain materials work. Aluminum or copper pans, while excellent conductors, are not magnetic. The magnetic field passes right through them with little interaction, failing to generate significant eddy currents. Your pan must be ferromagnetic to effectively capture the energy of the magnetic field and transform it into a storm of heat.

The Art of Taming the Fire: Engineering in the Real World

Understanding the physics is one thing; building a reliable, safe, and precise appliance for a home kitchen is another. This is where modern engineering shines, and a device like the Duxtop LCD Portable Double Induction Cooktop (model 9620LS) serves as a perfect case study in taming this invisible fire.

First, there’s the challenge of creating the high-frequency magnetic field. Your wall outlet supplies a sluggish 60 Hz alternating current, which is far too slow. Inside the cooktop, a sophisticated piece of power electronics called an inverter acts as a frequency multiplier, taking that 60 Hz input and converting it into a high-frequency current (typically 20-100 kHz) to drive the coil. This is the source of the faint hum you sometimes hear.

Next is the challenge of control. How do you go from a furious boil to a gentle simmer? You can’t just “turn down the flame.” Instead, the cooktop’s digital brain uses pulsing. At lower power settings, it doesn’t supply a weaker continuous field. Instead, it cycles the high-power field on and off very rapidly. With 20 distinct power levels, the Duxtop can precisely manage the on/off ratio, delivering an average power output that provides a level of responsiveness and low-temperature stability that gas stoves struggle to match.

Perhaps the most elegant piece of engineering, however, is the solution to a fundamental limitation: your home’s electrical circuit. A standard North American outlet is rated for 15 amps at 120 volts, providing a maximum continuous power of 1800 watts. The Duxtop 9620LS has two burners, so how does it avoid instantly tripping your breaker?

It employs power sharing. The unit’s software constantly monitors the total power draw. The left burner can command the full 1800 watts, while the right is capped at 1000 watts. If you are using both and increase the power on one, the system intelligently and automatically limits the maximum power available to the other, ensuring the total never exceeds the 1800-watt ceiling. This isn’t a flaw; it’s a brilliant engineering trade-off, perfectly balancing the desire for maximum cooking power with the unyielding laws of household electricity.

The Quiet Revolution

The result of this century-spanning journey from laboratory to kitchen is nothing short of revolutionary. Because the energy transfer is so direct, induction is incredibly efficient. Manufacturers claim energy efficiency ratings as high as 83%, compared to roughly 70% for electric coil and a mere 40% for gas. That wasted energy from gas and electric stoves is what heats up your kitchen and the handles of your pans. With induction, the energy goes where it’s supposed to: your food.

The physics also makes it inherently safer. The glass surface stays cool, only warming from contact with the hot pan. If you remove the pan, the electromagnetic circuit is broken, and the heating stops instantly. There are no fumes, no risk of gas leaks, and no open flames.

Looking back, the path from Faraday’s twitching needle to the silent power of a modern induction cooktop is a testament to the long, often unpredictable arc of scientific progress. It reminds us that the most profound technologies are often those that hide their immense complexity behind a simple, elegant interface. This invisible fire, born from pure curiosity about the fundamental forces of our universe, is more than just a better way to cook. It’s a quiet, daily reminder that the world is still full of unseen wonders, waiting to be understood.