Solvent from a different planet

A University of Bristol team has dissolved iron in liquid surfactant to create a soap that can be controlled by magnets. The discovery could be used to create cleaning products that can be removed after application and used in the recovery of oil spills at sea. Rather than 'soap', the substance should more correctly be called a surfactant, which is a contraction of surface acting agent. These chemicals are characterised by having two groups which are knitted together, but those two groups have totally opposite tendencies. One of the groups is strongly hydrophobic and the other is strongly hydrophilic; it is this schizophrenia, or tension, in the molecule that explains all of the properties of soaps and surfactants and the action of detergents.