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Electric Charges. Have you ever walked across a carpet in stocking feet and reached for the doorknob only to be “zapped” by an unexpected shock? Why does your hair mysteriously stand on end after you pull off a wool hat on a winter day? These event are actually caused by the same thing!.
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Have you ever walked across a carpet in stocking feet and reached for the doorknob only to be “zapped” by an unexpected shock? Why does your hair mysteriously stand on end after you pull off a wool hat on a winter day? These event are actually caused by the same thing!
Shocking, Isn’t It? • To explain why you get a shock by touching a doorknob after walking across the carpet, we need to become familiar with static electricity • Particularly: • Electric Charges • Law of Attraction & Repulsion • How objects become charged • Insulators & Conductors
Charges Recall, the atom…. Eureka
What Is A “Charge”? • All objects are made of atoms • Atoms contain protons, neutrons and electrons • An atom must keep their protons and neutrons “trapped” inside their nucleus. • Electrons are “free” to move around.
What Is A “Charge”? • When an object contains an unequal number of protons and electrons it is said to be charged • Negatively charged means there are more electrons than protons • Positively charged means there are more protons than electrons
When an object contains an equal number of protons and electrons it is said to be neutral • Neutral objects do not carry a charge • Benjamin Franklin named charges “positive” and “negative” about 100 years before the electron was discovered
Law of Attraction & Repulsion • Scientists found that a charged object will either attract or repel another charged object • Two objects with the same charge will repel each other • Two objects with opposite charges will attract each other • This is summarised in the “Law of Attraction and Repulsion” Like charges repel, unlike charges attract
This force of attraction or repulsion is known as electric force. • Object that exert an electric force are said to have an electric charge.
A neutral object has an equal number of protons and elections. • An object that has more electrons than protons is negatively charged. • An object that has fewer electrons that protons is positively charged. PLAY: Electric Field Hockey