Increasingly, the use of computers (especially using open-access programs) is tapped in science education in general and particularly in Physics. Furthermore, the scientific instrumentation remains costly and difficult to maintain. Finally, it is desirable that students are able to go beyond the simple reproduction of known results, and that with the tools at their disposal, can solve new problems or designing equipment that can represent unique advances. For these reasons, versatile simulation systems (at relatively low cost), are very well received by the scientific and academic communities, either for purely educational purposes, either for scientific research or instrumental development. Following these lines, this article describes the construction of a virtual instrument using a data acquisition system, which includes a well-known software and a particular physical method. The device allows to plot the curves of acquired data and make different analyzes on them. Although it was designed for a particular application (obtaining hysteresis curves of soft magnetic tapes), the system is flexible enough to be used after minor changes in other magnetic applications, or after changes slightly more laborious, as instruments for measuring other physical quantities. The article ultimately gives the necessary steps to address other problems involving the data acquisition and processing.
Keywords:
virtual instrumentation; software/hardware LabVIEW; hysteresis loop and magnetic characterization
