For those who took introductory physics, you realized in regards to the “elementary forces.” It goes one thing like this: All interactions are the results of a number of of 5 fundamental forces: sturdy nuclear, weak nuclear, gravity, electrical, and magnetic. “Doing physics,” then, means figuring out the forces in play.
There’s an issue, although, which could not have been talked about: The forces you observe rely in your vantage level—your “body of reference.” Look out the window. Bushes, homes, lawns—they’re all stationary, proper? However have a look at that very same spot from house and it’s transferring a thousand miles an hour. It seemed nonetheless to you earlier than since you had been transferring with it.
We’ve got this similar downside with electrical and magnetic fields. Relying in your reference body, what seems to be a magnetic drive from one spot seems to be an electrical drive from one other.
Is your mind melting but? Simply wait—it will get even weirder. To know what’s happening right here, let’s first have a look at electrical and magnetic forces in isolation.
The Electrical Power
See all that stuff round you? The whole lot. It is all product of simply three issues: protons, electrons, and neutrons. That is form of wild when you concentrate on it. Two of those elementary particles have an electrical cost: the negatively charged electron and the optimistic proton.
If an object has extra electrons than protons, it is going to have a internet destructive cost. So, that sock within the dryer that adheres to all the things? It picked up further electrons by rubbing towards different garments. If an object loses electrons it has a optimistic cost.
We are able to calculate the electrostatic drive between two charged objects with Coulomb’s legislation. This says that the drive between them relies on the product of their prices and the way far aside they’re. For instance, I constructed this high-tech contraption beneath, which has two little foam blocks hanging on strings. I gave them each a destructive cost, which suggests they’ll repel one another. Test it out:
