ST. MARY’S CONVENT SR. SEC.

SCHOOL
SESSION -2022-23

PHYSICS INVESTIGATORY
PROJECT.
TOPIC:- COULOMB’S LAW

Name- Tanu
Class – XIIth-A
Roll. no. - 46
CERTIFICATE
            
            This is to certify that  _TANU____________ of   Class- XII ,
section- A has successfully completed the physics investigatory
project entitled ,

“To estimate the charge induced on each one of the two identical
styro foam balls or pith balls suspended in a vertical plane by
making use of Coulomb’s law.”
   This report is the  result of her endeavours and research. It is
finalized under our guidance and supervision  in the academic
year 2022-2023.

INTERNAL EXAMINER EXTERNAL EXAMINER

     
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
In the accomplishment of this project successfully many
people have bestowed on me their blessings and their
immense support. 
I would like to express my special thanks of gratitude to
my teacher Mr. HansRajn as well as our principal Sr.
Tomsy SIC who gave me the golden opportunity to do
this wonderful project on the topic “To estimate the
charge induced on each one of the two identical styro
foam balls or pith balls suspended in a vertical plane
by making use of Coulomb’s law.” which also helped
me in doing a lot of research and I came to know about
so many new things. Secondly, I would also like to
thank my parents and my friends who helped me a lot in
finalizing this project within the given time.
Last but not the least I would like to thank all the people
who had helped me directly or indirectly during the
completion of this project.
                                              
                                                                  Tanu
                                                                                          CLASS-XII 

To  estimate the 

charge induced on
 each one of the two
identical styro foam
balls or pith balls
suspended in a
vertical plane by
making use of
Coulomb’s law

2016-17 PHYSICS INVESTIGATORY

CLASS-XII PROJECT

          INTRODUCTION
           Ancient cultures around the Mediterranean knew that certain objects,
such as rods of amber, could be rubbed with cat's fur to attract light objects like
feathers. Thales of Miletus made a series of observations on static electricity
around 600 BC, from which he believed that friction rendered amber magnetic,
in contrast to minerals such as magnetite, which needed no rubbing. Thales was
incorrect in believing the attraction was due to a magnetic effect, but later
science would prove a link between magnetism and electricity. Electricity
would remain little more than an intellectual curiosity for millennia until 1600,
when the English scientist William Gilbert made a careful study of electricity
and magnetism, distinguishing the lodestone effect from static electricity
produced by rubbing amber. He coined the New Latin word electricus ("of
amber" or "like amber", from ἤλεκτρον [elektron], the Greek word for "amber")
to refer to the property of attracting small objects after being rubbed. This
association gave rise to the English words "electric" and "electricity", which
made their first appearance in print in Thomas Browne's Pseudodoxia
Epidemica of 1646. 

Early investigators of the 18th century who suspected that the electrical force
diminished with distance as the force of  gravity did (i.e., as the inverse square
of the distance) included Daniel Bornoulli  and Alessandro Volta, both of whom
measured the force between plates of a capacitor, and Franz Aeipinus who
supposed the inverse-square law in 1758. Based on experiments with 
electrically charged spheres,  Joseph Priestly of England was among the first to
propose that electrical force followed an inverse square law, similar to
Newton’s law of universal gravitation. However, he did not generalize or
elaborate on this. In 1767, he conjectured that the force between charges varied
as the inverse square of the distance.   

In 1769, Scottish physicist John Robison announced that, according to his

measurements, the force of repulsion between two spheres with charges of the
same sign varied as x−2.06. In the early 1770s, the dependence of the force
between charged bodies upon both distance and charge had already been
discovered, but not published, by Henry Cavendish of England. 
Finally, in 1785, the French physicist Charles Augustin de Coulomb published
his first three reports of electricity and magnetism where he stated his law. This
publication was essential to the development of the theory of
electromagnetism.He used a torsion balance to study the repulsion and
attraction forces of charged particles, and determined that the magnitude of the
electric force between two point charges is directly proportional to the product
of the charges and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between
them.The torsion balance consists of a bar suspended from its middle by a thin
fiber. The fiber acts as a very weak torsion spring. In Coulomb's experiment, the
torsion balance was an insulating rod with a metal-coated ball attached to one
end, suspended by a silk thread. The ball was charged with a known charge of
static electricity, and a second charged ball of the same polarity was brought
near it. The two charged balls repelled one another, twisting the fiber through a
certain angle, which could be read from a scale on the instrument. By knowing
how much force it took to twist the fiber through a given angle, Coulomb was
able to calculate the force between the balls and derive his inverse-square
proportionality law.
AIM OF THE EXPERIMENT
To estimate the charge induced on each one of the
two identical styro foam balls or pith balls
suspended in a vertical plane by making use of
Coulomb’s law.

APPARATUS REQUIRED
Small size identical balls (pitch or soft plastic)
Physical balance or electrical balance
Half meter scale                               
Glass rod
Cotton thread
Silk cloth
Small stand

      
   THEORY
The fundamental concept of electrostatics is electric charge. We are all
familiar with the fact that rubbing two materials together –for example, a
rubber comb on cat fur- produces a “static” charge. The process is called
charging by friction. Surprisingly, the exact physics of the process of
charging by friction is poorly understood. However, it is known that the
making and breaking of contact between the two materials transfers the
charge.
The charged particles which make up the universe come in three kinds :
positive, negative and neutral. Neutral particles do not interact with
electrical forces . Charged particles exert electrical and magnetic forces and
is given by coulomb’s law on one another, but if the charges are
stationary ,the mutual force is very simple in form

 Where F is the electrical force between any two stationary charged

particles with charges q1 and q2(measured in coulombs), r is the
separation distance between the charges (measured in meters) , and k is a
constant of nature (equal to 8.9875517873681764×109 N m2 C−2  or 9×109 N m2
C−2    in SI units)  
The study of the Coulomb forces among arrangements of stationary charged
particles  is called electrostatics. Coulomb’s Law describes three properties of
the electrical force:
1. Force is inversely proportional to the square of the distance between
the charges and is directed along the straight line that connects their
centers.
2. The forces is proportional to the products of the magnitude of the
charges.
3. Two particles of the same charge exert a repulsive force on each
other, and two particles of opposite charge exert an attractive force
on each other.

 
                                   

Most of the common objects we deal with in the macroscopic (human

sized) world are electrically neutral. They are composed of atoms of
atom that consists of negatively charged electrons moving in
quantum motion around a positively charged nucleus. The total
negative charge of the electrons is equal to the total positive charge .
So the atoms as well as the entire object don’t have net electrical
charge. If we charge something by friction , there only occurs the
transfer of charges from one to another object. 
A neutral particle is not affected by electrical forces. A charged object
can attract neutral object by the method of electrical polarization. For
example, if a negatively charged rod is brought close to an isolated
neutral insulator, the electrons in the atoms of the insulator will be
pushed slightly away from the negative rod, and the positive nuclei
will be attracted slightly towards the negative rod. There occurs
induced polarization but net charge is always zero.

                                                   
                         

The polarization of charge in the insulator is small but now its positive
charge is a little closer to the negatively charged rod, and its negative
charge is a bit far away. Thus the positive charge is attracted to the rod
more strongly than the negative charge is repelled, and there is an overall
net attraction.
If the negatively charged rod is brought near an isolated , neutral conductor
, the conductor will also be polarized. In the conductor , electrons are free
to move through the material , and some of them are repelled over to the
opposite surface of the conductor, leaving the surface near the negative rod
with a net positive charge. The conductor has been  polarized and will now
be attracted to the charged rod.
Now if we connect a conducting wire or any other conducting material
from the polarized conductor to the ground, we provide a “path” through
which the electrons can move. Electrons will actually move along this path
to the ground. If the wire or path is subsequently disconnected ,the
conductor has been charged without actually being touched with the
charged rod. This process is called charging

induction.                   
Let the force between two stationary charges be F
F α q1q2                                                                                                                                        
F α 1/r2
From the above two expressions,
F= k q1q2/r2
   
=1/4πε0   q1q2/r2
Where k = 9 x 109 Nm2/C2
And is called absolute permittivity of free space or vacuum =8.854
x 10-12 C2 /N/ m2
Let the two identical pith balls (B1 and B2) of mass ‘m’ are hanged from strings
of length ‘l’ each .
When the two balls are given charge q1 and q2 respectively the electrostatic
force acting between them will be ,
 F= k q1q2/r2
Because of this force, they are separated by a distance ‘r’ as
shown in the figure .

Force acting on ball B1

(i)Weight of ball B1 , W= mg
(same as that of B2)

This can be resolved in two components mgcos0 and mgsin0 .

Component mgsin0 is the restoring component.
In state of equilibrium
Electrostatic force = mgsin0
Or , F = k q1q2/r2 = mgsin0

From  OBC , sin0 =r/2l

k q1q2/r2 = mg r/2l
 
If both the identical pith balls have same charge on them , then
q1=q2=q

K q2 / r2 = mgr /2l 
q=  √mgr3/2kl
By putting the values of ‘m’ , ‘r’ , ‘l’, ‘g’ and ‘k’ we can estimate the
charge on the two pith identically charged pith balls.

 
      PROCEDURE
        

1.Measure the mass (m) of each of the two

identical pith balls using a physical balance.
2.Hang the two balls from a rigid support using
light silk or cotton threads of same length ‘l’.
3.Take a glass rod and rub it with a silk cloth to
induce charge on the rod. Now touch the glass
rod with both the pith balls together so that
equal charge is induced on both the balls.
4.When left freely, the two balls will repel each
other and when they are at rest separated away
from each other , measure the distance

between them.
5.To change the charge on ball, take third
uncharged ball touch it to any one of the two
balls and take the third ball away, again
measure the distance between the two hanging
balls.
             

OBSERVATIONS
Mass of the pith balls   m=  01 gm.
Radius of the ball   a=  0.1 cm.
Length of thread  l= 9.5 cm.
Sl.no. Charge on Charge on Distance between
Ball B1 Ball B2 the two balls (in
cm)

01

02

03

04
                 
   CALCULATIONS

Charge on the pith ball q = √mgr /2kl

3

 CONCLUSION      
The charge on pith balls in different
cases are________ C.

               
1. The suspended balls should not
be touched by any conducting body.
2. Rub the glass rod properly with
silk rod to produce more charge.
3. Weight the mass of the balls
accurately.

             
BIBILOGRAPHY
        Internet, Wikipedia , Google, NCERT physics book class-12