Magnet
Many materials have unpaired electron spins, and the majority of these materials are paramagnetic. When the spins interact with each other in such a way that the spins align spontaneously, the materials are called ferromagnetic (what is often loosely termed as magnetic). Because of the way their regular crystalline atomic structure causes their spins to interact, some metals are ferromagnetic when found in their natural states, as ores. These include iron ore (magnetite or lodestone), cobalt and nickel, as well as the rare earth metals gadolinium and dysprosium (when at a very low temperature). Such naturally occurring ferromagnets were used in the first experiments with magnetism. Technology has since expanded the availability of magnetic materials to include various man-made products, all based, however, on naturally magnetic elements.
Tunable metamaterial
Since natural materials exhibit very weak coupling through the magnetic component of the electromagnetic wave, artificial materials that exhibit a strong magnetic coupling are being researched and fabricated. These artificial materials are known as metamaterials. The first of these were fabricated (in the lab) with an inherent, limited, response to only a narrow frequency band at any given time. Its main purpose was to practically demonstrate metamaterials. The resonant nature of metamaterials results in frequency dispersion and narrow bandwidth operation where the center frequency is fixed by the geometry and dimensions of the rudimentary elements comprising the metamaterial composite. These were followed by demonstrations of metamaterials that were tunable only by changing the geometry and/or position of their components. These have been followed by metamaterials that are tunable in wider frequency ranges along with strategies for varying the frequencies of a single medium (metamaterial). This is in contrast to the fixed frequency metamaterial, which is determined by the imbued parameters during fabrication.