Chapter 9 Flashcards
What is the study of the nature, behavior, and uses of static (stationary) electricity and related phenomena?
electrostatics
Who discovered that rubbing amber would cause bits of straw to be attracted?
Thales of Miletus
Who discovered that other materials besides amber would produce the same attractive force?
William Gilbert
Who discovered static electricity and the existence of two types of charge (negative and positive)?
Benjamin Franklin
What is a property that allows particles to attract and repel other charged particles by the electromagnetic force?
electric charge
What has a positive charge?
proton
What has a negative charge?
electron
What is the interaction between electrons and other charged particles?
electricity
What describes an atom or other object with an equal number of positive and negative charges?
neutral
What is an electric charge that is stationary on the surface of a charged object?
static electricity
What is the SI unit of electric charge?
Coulomb (C)
What is the law that states that opposite charges attract each other but like charges repel each other?
law of electric charge
What si the law stating that strength of the attraction or repulsion between two charged objects is directly related to the square of the distance between them?
law of electric force
What is the region around a charged object in which other objects are attracted or repelled by an electric force?
electric field
What are arrows that indicate that direction and strength of an electric field?
lines of force
What is an electric field with even strength throughout?
uniform field
What is the transfer of an electric charge through direct contact?
conduction
What is the law stating that the total electric charge is the same before and after?
law of conservation of charge
What is the process of diverting unwanted electric charge directly into the earth?
grounding
What is the process of imparting electric charge form one object to another without direct contact between the objects?
induction
What is the flow of charge from one place to another?
current
What is a simple device that uses the law of electrostatics to detect small electric charges?
electroscope
What are the liquids and solutions that contain ions?
electrolytes
What is the flow of electrons or other charged particles form one place to another?
current electricity
What is electricity that flows in only one direction, without reversing?
direct current (DC)
What is electricity that flows first in one direction and then the other, reversing at regular intervals?
alternating current (AC)
What is the work per unit of charge done to move electric charges between different parts of an electric field?
voltage
What is the SI unit of voltage, equal to one joule per unit coulomb?
volt (V)
What is the rate of charge “flow”?
current
What is the SI unit of current; informally called the amp?
Ampere (C/s)
What is the amount of energy used when one kW of power is used continuously for 1hr; equal to 3.6MJ?
Kilowatt-hour
What is a material through which current clows easily?
conductor
What is a material through which the current does not easily flow?
insulator
What is a material that is neither a good conductor nor a good insulator?
semiconductor
What is the amount of a certain object that hinders electron flow?
resistance
What is the unit of resitstance?
ohm
What is heat converted from the energy used to overcome electrical restistance?
joule heat
What is the main factors affecting resistence?
types of material, diameter of the conductor, length of the conductor, temperature
What is the most important factor affecting the ease of current flow?
the type of material
What is a material that allows current to flow through it with no resistance at all?
superconductor
What is the temperature at which a material becomes a superconductor?
critical temperature
What is the law stating that the current flowing through a conductor is directly proportional to the voltage and inversely proportional to the resistance?
Ohm’s law
What is an electrical device designed to add resistance to a circuit?
resistor
What is the path that an electric current follows?
electric current
What are the three main parts of a simple electric circuit?
a source of current, a set of conductors, a load
What is a device that transforms the energy of an electric current into another useful form of energy?
load
What is a circuit that contains a complete path for electrons to flow from the source of current, through the load and back to the source?
close circuit
What is a circuit in which a gap is made and electrons cannot cross through, causing the current flow to cease?
open circuit
What is a device that opens or closes a circuit?
switch
What is a dangerous situation that occurs if electricity has the opportunity to take a “shortcut” through a circuit, avoiding the load?
short circuit
What is a narrow strip of metal housed in a protective, metal case, used to guard against short circuits?
fuse
What is an automatic switch that opens a circuit when current flowing through it exceeds a predetermined amount?
circuit breaker
What is a circuit in which the loads are arranged so that the electric current flows through each load one after another?
series circuit
What is a circuit in which the load are arranged in separate branches of the circuit and the current is divided among them?
parallel circuit
In which type of circuit are the resistances of the individual loads add to each other?
series circuit
In which type of circuit is the voltage in each branch the same voltage of the circuit as a whole?
parallel circuit
In which type of circuit is the total resistance reduced as loads are added in parallelto the circuit?
parallel circuit
In which type of circuit are the resistances of the individual loads add to each other?
series circuit
What does electric current require in order to flow through a circuit?
a complete circuit
