ELECTRICITY

THE MAIN PARTS OF THE LESSON

THE MAIN PARTS OF THE LESSON
Electric charge
Electric charge in the atom
The law of conservation of charge
Insulators and conductors
Induced charge
The Electroscope

THE MAIN PARTS OF THE LESSON
Coulomb’s law
The electric field Electric field lines
Electric force acting on a charge
Electric field of a charged sphere
Conductors in an electric field

ELECTRIC CHARGE
Electricity comes from the Greek word electron which means amber. Ancient civilizations knew that when amber was rubbed with a cloth, it attracted hair, small pieces of leaves or dust.

A plastic ruler, a rubber or a glass rod perform the same task when they are rubbed with a cloth. You can easily pick up small pieces of paper using a plastic comb rubbed with a cloth as shown in figure.
ELECTRIC CHARGE

ELECTRIC CHARGE
All of us have experienced static electricity when combing our hair or when we slide across the seat and touch the metal body of a car to get a shock. In each case the object becomes electrically charged during a rubbing process. So objects can gain electric charge when they are rubbed against other objects.

ELECTRIC CHARGE
There are only two types of electric charge in nature: positive and negative.
The electric charge on a glass rod when it has been rubbed by a silk cloth is given the name positive and the electric charge on a plastic rod when it is rubbed by a woolen cloth is given the name negative.
+
-

ELECTRIC CHARGE
The two positively charged objects repel each other.

ELECTRIC CHARGE
The two negatively charged objects repel each other.

ELECTRIC CHARGE
The two oppositely charged objects attract each other.

ELECTRIC CHARGE
IN THE ATOM
An atom consists of protons, neutrons and electrons.

THE STRUCTURE OF AN ATOM
The modern theory of atoms assumes that an atom consists of a nucleus at its center and, is surrounded by negatively charged electrons, revolving around the nucleus at high speeds. The nucleus contains two types of particles; protons which are positively charged and neutrons which are electrically neutral.

THE STRUCTURE OF AN ATOM
The magnitude of the charges carried by protons and electrons are equal, but opposite in sign. Hence, an atom contains equal numbers of electrons and protons and is overall neutral. When a neutral atom gains or loses one or more electrons it becomes an ion, that is, a charged atom.

VIDEO 1
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE RUB A GLASS OR A PLASTIC WITH CLOTH?

THE LAW OF CONSERVATION OF CHARGE
Let us return to the observations about charging plastic or glass rods by rubbing them with a cloth. Both plastic and glass rods becomes electrically charged after rubbing.
What about the cloth?

THE LAW OF CONSERVATION OF CHARGE
When the rods becomes charged when rubbed with their cloths, their cloths must gain an equal amount of charge, but of the opposite sign.

THE LAW OF CONSERVATION OF CHARGE
Charge transfer between plastic rod and woolen cloth.

THE LAW OF CONSERVATION OF CHARGE
Charge transfer between glass rod and silk cloth.

THE LAW OF CONSERVATION OF CHARGE
We conclude that in any electrification process the sum of the electric charges on both objects is constant. This is known as the law of conservation of electric charge and can be stated as the total amount of electric charge in an isolated system is constant.

THE LAW OF CONSERVATION OF CHARGE

EXAMPLE №1

INSULATORS AND CONDUCTORS
We can classify substances according to their ability to conduct electric charge. Suppose we have two metal spheres, one charged and the other neutral.

INSULATORS AND CONDUCTORS
If we connect these metal spheres with a metal rod the previously neutral sphere quickly becomes charged.

INSULATORS AND CONDUCTORS
If instead of a metal rod, we connect the spheres with a wooden stick the neutral sphere does not become charged.

INSULATORS AND CONDUCTORS
Substances such as metal rods are conductors of electricity, whereas substances such as wood are insulators or nonconductors.
Conductor are substances in which electric charges can move freely.
Insulators are substances in which electric charges cannot readily move.

VIDEO 2
CONDUCTORS AND INSULATORS

SEMICONDUCTORS
Metals are generally good conductors, most other substances such as rubber, plastic, pure water, air etc. are insulators. Nearly all natural substances fall into one of these two groups, except for a few materials which are in between these two groups.

SEMICONDUCTORS
These are known as semiconductors and include silicon, germanium and carbon.

INDUCED CHARGE
When a glass rod is rubbed with a cloth it attracts small pieces of paper. In the rubbing process the glass rod becomes positively charged, however the small pieces of paper are neutral. How does the positively charged glass attract the neutral pieces of paper? Another example of this phenomena is a balloon rubbed against a carpet which can stick to a neutral wall for a long time.

A charged rod attracts neutral pieces of paper.

A charged balloon can stick to the wall.

CHARGE ACCUMULATION
BY INDUCTION
Suppose a positively charged rod is brought close to a neutral metal slab (without touching it).

CHARGE ACCUMULATION
BY INDUCTION
Some of the free electrons of the metal slab are attracted by the positively charged rod and accumulate at the left and of the metal. Since the electrons do not leave the metal slab, it is still neutral. The charges which accumulate at both ends of the slab are called induced charges.

We conclude that materials can be charged in three ways
By rubbing (or friction)
By contact
By induction

EXAMPLE №2
Two neutral metallic spheres, A and B, are in contact with each other. Sphere A is grounded, as shown in figure. A negatively charged object C is brought close to sphere B. What will the charges of the spheres be, after cutting the grounding wire?

THE ELECTROSCOPE
An electroscope is a device used to check whether an object is charged or not. It contains two very thin leaves, usually made of aluminum, inside a cage.

Metal knob
Leaves

The leaves are connected to the metal knob by a conductor. The conductor and the metal knob are insulated from the cage.

When a positively charged object is brought close to the knob, the leaves separate due to the free electrons which are attracted to the knob, thus the leaves both acquire the same amount of positive charge.

When the object touches the knob, the electroscope is charged positively. If we remove the object, the leaves remain separated. In both cases, the separation of the leaves is greater as the charge on the leaves is greater.

EXAMPLE №3
A charged rod is brought close to the knob of a positively charged electroscope. We observe that the separation between the leaves decreases. What is the charge on the rod? If the rod is allowed to touch the electroscope what do we observe?

Solution
If the separation between the leaves decreases, it means that the leaves become less charged. This shows that some negative charges are repelled from the knob to the leaves of the electroscope making them less positively charged. The negative charges can be repelled by the negatively charged rod. Therefore, the rod is negatively charged.

COULOMB’S LAW
We have seen that electric charges apply forces upon each other. The nature of these forces was firstly explained by French scientist Charles Coulomb (1736-1806) in 1785.

VIDEO 3
COULOMB’S LAW

He used a torsion balance which is a device very similar to that used by Cavendish for his studies on the gravitational force.

COULOMB’S LAW

The force is attractive if the charges are of opposite sign and repulsive if the charges are of the same sign.
The force always has a direction along the line joining the two point particles.

EXAMPLE №4

THE ELECTRIC FIELD
When you push or pull a cart or kick a ball you apply a force on these objects. These forces are called contact forces, since two objects (your hands and the cart or your foot and the ball) are in physical contact.

THE ELECTRIC FIELD
The gravitational force and the electric force are both action-at-a distance forces. British scientist, Michael Faraday, (1791-1867) first developed the field theory that explains the nature of forces between electrically charged objects. According to Faraday, an electric field surrounds any electrically charged object. A second charge experiences a force when it is placed in the electric field produced by the first charge.

THE ELECTRIC FIELD
Consider a charged particle +q as shown in figure.

THE ELECTRIC FIELD

THE ELECTRIC FIELD

THE ELECTRIC FIELD
As we see from the definition, the electric field produced by a charge is a vector whose direction is the direction of the force acting on a positive test charge at that point. The magnitude of the electric field is force per unit charge. The electric field produced by a point charge, q cab be found from

The SI unit of electric field is the Newton/Coulomb (N/C).

THE SUPERPOSITION PRINCIPLE

EXAMPLE №5

VIDEO 4
ELECTRIC FIELD

ELECTRIC FORCE ACTING ON A CHARGE

Consider a charge, Q that produces an electric field at a point P, as shown in figure.

If we place a negatively and a positively charged particle in a uniform electric field, they experience forces in opposite directions.

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Electricity and Magnetism, Zambak publishing, Ahmet Aki, Salim Gur