[mag′ned·ik ′məl·tə‚pōl] (electromagnetism) One of a series of types of static or oscillating distributions of magnetization, which is a magnetic multipole of order 2; the electric and magnetic fields produced by a magnetic multipole of order 2nare equivalent to those of two magnetic multipoles of order 2n-1of equal strength but opposite sign, separated from each other by a short distance.