Resistance

Name:
Zhalyan Sardar Ali

Date:
April 19, 2020

Dr. Dastan Khalid

Section 3
Introduction:
Resistance is a constant in ohms, that restricts the flow of current in a circuit. Even though
different types of conductors have a constant resistance, but its value corresponds to the change
of the area (A), length (L), and the resistivity () of the conductor expressed as following:
ρ×L
R=
A
In this experiment we are going to observe the change of the value of the resistor due to the
change of resistivity, length, and area separately.

Material:
This is a virtual lab where you will find the equipment on
(https://phet.colorado.edu/sims/html/resistance-in-a-wire/latest/resistance-in-a- wire_en.html).

Procedure:
Using the setup attached in the next page, each of the following parts was repeated five times to
get enough data to plot the graphs and find their correlation:

1) Keeping the values of length and area constant, changing the value of the resistivity, and then
recording the value of the corresponding resistance.

2) Keeping the values of resistivity and area constant, changing the value of the length, and then
recording the value of the corresponding resistance.

3) Keeping the values of length and resistivity constant, changing the value of the area, and then
recording the value of the corresponding resistance.

Note that the values in the picture are not accurate since the picture was attached to demonstrate
the setup of the experiment.
Data:
Followings are the data acquired in the experiment:

Table 1
L = 3.3 cm A = 2.5 cm 2
Resistivity (cm) Resistance ()
0.50 0.66
0.22 0.29
0.35 0.46
0.68 0.90
0.84 1.1

Table 2
ρ = 0.30 cm A = 3.3 cm2
Length (cm) Resistance ()
2.0 0.18
3.8 0.35
6.8 0.63
8.2 0.73
10.5 0.96

Table 3
L = 7.5 cm ρ = 0.40 cm
Area (cm) Resistance ()
4.3 0.70
6.15 0.49
7.48 0.40
8.4 0.36
9.7 0.31
Discussion:

Relation of Resistance and Resistivity

1.2

1 f(x) = 1.32230669686186 x − 0.00095486897444208

R² = 0.999999638594646
0.8
Resistance ()

0.6

0.4

0.2

0
0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9
Resistivity (cm)

The slope of the line is 1.32, considering the relation below:

R L
=
ρ A
L 3.3
Slope of the line =
A
= 2.5
= 1.3

Therefore, the slope of the line is equal to the ratio of length to area.

Relation of Resistance and Length

1.2
1
f(x) = 0.0920333723355548 x − 0.000297044309915173
0.8
Resistance ()

R² = 0.999998662337149
0.6
0.4
0.2
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

Length (cm)

The slope of the line is 0.092, considering the relation below:

R ρ
=
L A
ρ 0.30
Slope of the line =
A
= 3.3
= 0.091
 Therefore, the slope of the line is almost equal to the ratio of resistivity to area.

Relation of Resistance and Area

0.8
0.7
f(x) = 2.99512600538483 x + 0.000404699166506262
0.6 R² = 0.99999711342484
Resistance ()

0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
0.08 0.1 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.18 0.2 0.22 0.24 0.26
Area (cm2)

The slope of the line is 2.99, considering the relation below:

R Note that 1/A is used in the
=ρ × L
1 graph.
A
Slope of the line = ρ × L = 0.40 × 7.49 = 2.99
Therefore, the slope of the line is equal to the product of resistivity and length.
It was shown that when the value of length and resistivity increase, the conductor will have a
greater resistance, therefore they are directly proportionate to each other. Even though the slope
of the third graph was positive, the fact that 1/A was plotted instead of A, means that the relation
between resistance and area can be determined using the following graph:

Relation of Resistance and Area

0.8
0.7
0.6 f(x) = − 0.0720892322186461 x + 0.969833222723191
Resistance ()

0.5 R² = 0.941592418376408
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
Area (cm2)
In the graph it is shown that the slope of the line is negative, meaning that resistance and area are
inversely proportionate.

Conclusion:
The value of the resistance of a conductor depends on the resistivity, length, and its area. Having
a larger length and resistivity results in a larger resistance, however the larger the cross-sectional
area is, the smaller the resistance would get.