Local-to-global heating crossover in chains of nanomagnets: A two-scale analytical framework

Abstract

We develop a two-scale analytical formalism to study heat generation and thermal transport in one-dimensional systems of nanomagnets subjected to a uniform alternating magnetic field. At the nanoscale, each nanomagnet acts as a localized, temperature-dependent heat source governed by its magnetic response, dipolar interactions, and interfacial coupling to the matrix, characterized by a nanoscale volumetric loss coefficient $L_m$. After spatial and temporal averaging, we obtain a coarse-grained assembly-scale equation with effective heating terms and a macroscopic loss coefficient $L_N$. Using modal decomposition, we solve both equations exactly under Dirichlet and Neumann boundary conditions and establish explicit conditions for a local-to-global heating crossover; this is governed by the competition between heat generation, diffusion, dipolar coupling, and hierarchical losses. The crossover is quantified through the spatial correlation length and temperature variance, with stability criteria incorporating both diffusion and nanoscale losses. The coarse-graining procedure is derived rigorously, and its systematic approximation errors are quantified. For prototypical magnetic hyperthermia systems, such as magnetite nanomagnets in water, our formalism reveals that realistic parameters place these systems firmly in the collective heating regime, with local temperature variations at the $\simμ$K level, which is currently unresolvable experimentally. The continuum Fourier description used here is validated by a Knudsen-number analysis ($\mathrm{Kn} \ll 1$ for amorphous polymer and aqueous matrices).