Diamagnetisme er et fænomen, der optræder i alle stoffer, der udsættes for et magnetfelt. Magnetfeltets påvirkning af stoffet gør, at der opstår et modsat rettet magnetfelt internt i stoffet, hvorved det ydre magnetfeltet svækkes - dvs. stoffet frastøder magnetfeltet.
Diamagnetisme skyldes de elektroner, som bevæger sig i orbitaler omkring materialets atomer. Når disse udsættes for et magnetfelt, påvirkes de af en kraft kaldet Lorentz-kraft, som stiger proportionalt med den magnetiske fluxtæthed i anden[1]. Lorentz-kraften drejer orbitalerne så elektronernes bevægelse danner et magnetfelt, der er modsat rettet det påtrykte. Dette er en konsekvens af Lenz' lov.
^ abru.nl: The Frog That Learned to FlyArkiveret 27. august 2013 hos Wayback Machine Citat: "...On the other hand, the enclosed photographs of water and a frog hovering inside a magnet (not on board a spacecraft) are somewhat counterintuitive and will probably take many people (even physicists) by surprise. This is the first observation of magnetic levitation of living organisms as well as the first images of diamagnetics levitated in a normal, room-temperature environment...This result should not come as a surprise because, as we know, magnetic fields of less than 0.1T can levitate a superconductor (χ= -1) and, from the formulas above, the magnetic force increases as B^2..."
^youtube.com: Diamagnetic LevitationArkiveret 26. juli 2016 hos Wayback Machine Citat: "...Organisms levitate in a 32mm vertical bore of a Bitter solenoid in a magnetic field of about 16 Tesla at the Nijmegen High Field Magnet Laboratory..."