What is an Electric Field?
- naamomoh
- Sep 19, 2024
- 1 min read
Updated: Aug 26
Discover what an Electric Field is and how it influences charged particles.
Electrostatic force is one of the fundamental Laws of nature and is in relation to electrical charges. When an uncharged particle gains or loses an electron, it either becomes more positive or negative meaning it now carries a charge. Like charged particles (negative and negative or positive and positive) repel each other and unlike charged particles (positive and negative) attract each other. The strength of the attraction or repulsion force is affected by distance ie. The closer to the particle, the stronger the force.
Now imagine particle A is in a space and a bunch of other charges are randomly thrown in the mix. At different locations in this space, particle A will feel different intensities of pull and push forces on it. This is as a result of different attraction and repelling forces acting on particle A from the other like and unlike charges at varying distances from it. multiple configurations of force pulling/pushing. In this space of multiple configurations of forces, the force felt per charge is the electric field and has the unit Newton/Coloumb (N/C)