Electric Charges and Fields

1.1 Introduction
Electricity is the study of electric charges.

Phenomena such as lightning, pieces of paper getting attracted to a comb after

combing your hair, the spark or hearing a crackle on synthetic clothes are all
associated with static electric charges. (Static means anything which does not
move.)

Electrostatics is the study of electric charges at rest and their associated

phenomena .It deals with the study of electric forces, fields and potentials
arising from static charges.

1.2 Electric Charge:

Charge can be defined as an excess or deficiency of electrons. There are two
types Positive and Negative. The object which has less electrons is positively
charged and the body which has more or excess electrons is negatively
charged.

The most simplest way of creating charged bodies is by rubbing or by friction

where pairs of materials can be oppositely charged. An ebonite rod rubbed
with fur gets charged –vely with fur loosing electrons to the rod. A glass rod
rubbed with silk gets charged +vely by losing its electrons to the silk cloth.

Several experiments has led to the conclusion that Like charges repel and
unlike charges attract. Also when an object posseses no charge, then the body
is said to be neutral but if it contains charges, then the object or body is said to
be electrified.

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1.3 Electroscope is a simple device used to detect electric charges rather to
investigate the electrostatic properties of objects. It consists of a vertical
metal rod housed in a box with two thin gold leaves attached to its bottom end
and the top end is attached a metal disc or a metallic sphere or ball. To prevent
charges residing on the housed cage, the body of the cage is insulated from the
electroscope and also earthed.

When a charged object is brought and touched to the metallic sphere or the
metal knob, charges flow through the rod to the gold leaves and then they
diverge.

To determine the charge on a body, firstly check that the electroscope is

discharged. When a known charged body (say +ve) is brought and touched to
the metal cap and if the gold leaves diverge then the electroscope gets
charged.

Bring a second body whose charge is unknown and to determine its charge,
touch it to the previously +vely charged electroscope. If the leaves diverge
further then the body is charged positive. If the leaves fall instead of diverging
then the body is charged –vely as it discharges the +vely charged electroscope.

1.4 Methods of charging bodies (By conduction & Induction)

1. Charging by conduction or friction: When a glass rod rubbed with silk, it

develops +ve charge. This is because frictional forces between the silk
and glass removes electrons from the glass rod and deposits them on
the silk. This method is called charging by friction.
2. Charging by Induction: When a charged glass rod is brought near a
conductor with an insulating stand ( sphere shown in the figure).

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 The electrons of the conductor moves towards the side facing the
charged rod leaving =ve charges on the farther end ( fig a) . When the
farther end is earthed by connecting it to ground temporarily then
electrons from the ground neutralise the =ve charges (fig b). The
connection is removed and the charged still rod is still held in front of
the conductor with out touching it (fig c). Removing the charged rod
away leaves the conductor –vely charged. This method of charging a
conductor by bringing a charged body not in contact or not touching is
called charging by induction.
Electrostatic Induction is the process of charging a body with out contact
when an uncharged body is placed near a charged body, it acquires the
opposite nature of charge at its surface facing the charged body and
same nature of charge at its farther surface or opposite end.
Frictional electricity is the electric charge produced by friction.

Point Charges : If sizes of charged bodies are very small when compared to
their distances between them, then they become point charges.

1.5 Properties of Electric charges

Negative charges reside on particles called electrons which surround the

nucleus while positive charges reside on particles called protons present in the
nuclei of atoms. Electrons are lighter than nuclei and easy to move. This also
means that bodies get charged only by transfer of electrons from one object to
other in solids but in liquids both positive and negative ions tend to move.

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Substances which allow passage of electricity through them are called
conductors. They do so because of a large number of free electrons present in
them. Examples of conductors are metals, graphite.

Substances which do not allow electricity to pass through them are called
insulators. They do not allow since they do not have any free electron. ( A free
electron is not associated to any particular atom).

1. Additivity of charges : If a system contains 3 charges q1 , q2, q3 then the

total charge in the system is obtained by adding all the three charges i.e
q = q1 + q2+ q3 . Charges can be added as they contain only magnitude
and no direction. In general q = q1 + q2+ q3 .............qn.
2. Charge is conserved (A very important property): The total charge of an
isolated system is always conserved. In other words the total charge of
an isolated system cannot change. It is not possible to create or destroy
net charge carried by any isolated system.A neutron turns into a proton
and an electron. The proton and neutron so created has opposite
charges and the net charge is still zero before and after creation.
3. Quantization of charge: The basic unit of charge is denoted by letter ‘e’.
If there are n charges, then charge q on a body is q=ne where n can
represent any integer. Electric charge is always an integral multiple of e
which is termed as quantization of charge.
4. In SI system, the unit of charge is Coulomb and denoted by the letter C.
It is defined as follows: one coloumb is the charge flowing through a
conductor in 1 sec if the current is 1 Ampere . The charge of an electron
is e = 1.602192 x 10-19 C.

1.6 Coulomb’s law for Electric force between two charges

Coulomb discovered that the electric force between two charges Q1 and Q2 is
inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them and directly
proportional to the product of the two charges . The forces are attractive for
opposite charges and repulsive for similar charges.

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In equation form , colulomb’s law is written as

Where ἐo is the permitivitty of free space and ἐr is the permittivity of medium

other than air or vacuum.

The value of ἐo = 8.854 X 10-12 C2 N-1 m2

Unit of Charge - Coulomb

The unit of charge is Coulomb and is denoted by C. One coulomb of charge, is

that charge which when placed one metre from another charge in vacuum
experiences an electrical force of repulsion of magnitude 9 x 109 N .

Vector form of Coulomb's Law

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(a) If q1q2 > 0, that is either both q1 and q2 are positive or both are negative,
then the charges repel each other.

(b) If q1q2 < 0, that is if the charges are dissimilar, then the charges attract each
other.

Thus Coulomb’s law also proves Newton’s third law.

1.7 Forces between Multiple Charges

Coulomb’s law is only applicable to two charges and not for a system
containing several charges. Consider a system of n stationary charges q1 , q2, q3
.............qn in vacuum. The force on any charge due to other charges have to be
found out and then all the individual forces have to be summated together as
per the principle of superposition.

Principle of superposition states that force on any charge due to a number of

other charges is the vector sum of all the forces on that charge due to the
other charges taken one at a time. The individual forces are unaffected due to
the presence of other charges.

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Consider a system of three charges q1 , q2 , and q3 as shown in fig (a). The
force on one charge q1 due to two other charges q2 q3 can be obtained by
vector addition of forces due to each one of these charges .

Force on q1 due to q2 is given by F12 by coulombs law even though other

charges are present

Force on q1 due to q3 is given by F13 which again is coulomb force even though
other charges are present.

Total force F1 on q1 due to two charges q2 and q3 is given as

This calculation can be generalised to n charges as shown in fig b.

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The total force F1 on charge q1 due to all other charges is given by the vector
sum of forces F12 , F13, ………. F1n .

ELECTRIC FIELD
It is the region in which an electric charge experiences a force. An electric field
is said to exist at a point if a force is exerted on a stationary charge placed at
that pont. It is defined as the electrostatic force per unit test charge acting on a
vanishingly small positive test charge placed at the given point.

If a test charge q0 experiences a Force F in an electric field, then Electric field is

Physical significance of electric field: By knowing the electric field at any point,
we can determine force on a charge placed at that point. The coulomb force on
charge q0 due to source charge q may be treated in two stages

(i) Source charge q produces a definite electric field E(r) at every point r.
(ii) Value of E(r) at any point r determines force on charge q0 at that
point. ⃗⃗⃗
𝑭 = 𝒒𝟎 ⃗𝑬 ⃗ (𝒓)

Electrostatic force = Charge x Electric field.

Electric field due to a point charge:

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Consider a point charge q placed at origin O. To determine electric field at a
point P at a distance r , place or imagine a test charge q0 at point P.

According to coulombs law, force on charge q0 is

Electric field at point P is

Since E is inversely proportional to square of r, the magnitude of E is same and

does not depend on direction of r. Such a field is called spherically symmetric
or radial field.

Electric field due to a system of charges:

Consider a system of N point charges q1, q2, …………..qn having position vectors

r1, r2, ................... rn with respect to origin O. Like the electric field at a point
in space due to a single charge, the electric field at a point in space due to a
system of charges is defined to be the force experienced by a unit test charge
placed at that point with out disturbing the other charges.

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Electric field due to charge q1 at point P is given by

Electric field at point P due to charge q2 is given by

According to the principle of superposition of electric fields, the electric field

at any point due to a group of charges is equal to the vector sum of the electric
fields produced by each charge individually at that point .

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Electric field lines
The imaginary path followed by a test charge in electric field is called electric
field line. The diagram shows the direction of electric field lines for different
charge systems.

Properties of electric field lines

1. The electric field lines start from a positive charge and terminate into a
negative charge.
2. The tangent drawn at any point on field line gives the direction of the
electric field at that point.
3. Lines of force are continous curves with out any break.
4. No two lines of force can intersect each other because two direction of
electric field are not possible.

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 5. Field lines are always normal to the surface of a conductor
6. Electric field lines do not exist in metals.
7. Electric field lines are parallel and equidistant in uniform electric field.
8. Electric field lines move apart when they pass through dielectrics
9. The relative closeness of lines of force indicate the strength of electric
field at different points.
10.Number of field lines are proportional to the magnitude ofelectric
charge.

Electric flux
Electric flux through a given area held inside an electric field is the total
number of electric lines of force passing normally through that area.

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As shown in diagram, if normal drawn to area element makes an angle θ with
the uniform field E normal to dS will be E cos θ so that the electric flux is

ELECTRIC DIPOLE
It is a system of two equal and opposite charges +q and –q separated by an
infinitely small separation 2l. The direction of the dipole is the direction from -
q to +q. The total charge of the electric dipole is zero but it does not mean
that the field of the electric dipole is zero.

The dipole moment of an electric dipole is the product of either charge and
length of the dipole. It is a vector quantity and denoted by letter p.

Torque of a dipole:
When a dipole is placed in a uniform electric field its positive charge
experiences a force in the direction of the field and negative charge in the
opposite direction of the field in equal magnitude. Hence there is no net force

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on the dipole but the dipole experiences a torque to align it in the direction of
the field. The torque on the dipole is equal to the product of force and the
perpendicular length of the dipole.

Electric Field due to a Dipole: (i) At Axial position

Let there be a point P on the axial position of the electric dipole of dipole
moment p at the distance r from its midpoint.
The electric intensity at P due to +q,

The electric intensity at P due to –q,

The net electric field at the point P,

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(ii)At the equatorial position

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Continuous Distribution of charge: are of three types
Linear charge distribution : is when charge is distributed along the length. The
distributed charge per unit length is called linear charge density (λ).

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Surface charge distribution is when charge is distributed over a surface. The
charge distributed per unit surface area is called surface charge density (σ).

Volume charge distribution is when charge is distributed in a volume. The

charge distributed per unit volume is called volume charge density (ρ).

GAUSS’s theorem or law:

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