IB Physics: Topic B.

5 – Current & Circuits

B.5.1 Electric Charge
• Electric Charge is a property of matter. Ordinarily, matter
appears electrically neutral, but we can physically
manipulate matter to have a positive or negative charge.
• Curious people did experiments by rubbing various
materials on glass or amber since the times of the Ancient
Greeks and through the middle ages.
– In fact, the word “electron” means amber in Greek.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Charge
• If we take two plastic rods and rub each with a piece of
wool, we find that the two rods repel each other.
• If we take two glass rods and rub each with a piece of silk,
we find that again the rods repel each other.
• However, if we take a singular plastic rod rubbed with wool
and a singular glass rod rubbed with silk, we find that when
they are placed near each other, they are attracted.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Charge
• We can understand the observations by making the
following assumptions:
– Charge can be positive or negative, and the process
of rubbing involves the transfer of charge from one
object to the other.
– There is a force between charged objects that can be
attractive or repulsive.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Charge
• From experiments with charged objects, we learn that
there is a force of attraction between charges of opposite
sign and a force of repulsion between charges of the same
sign.
• The magnitude of force becomes smaller as the distance
between the charged bodies increases.
• In ordinary matter, negative charge is a property of
subatomic particles called electrons.
• Positive charge is a property of subatomic particles called
protons which exist in the nuclei of atoms.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Properties of Electric Charge
• An important property of electric charge is that it is
quantized. This means the amount of electric charge on a
body is always an integral multiple of a basic unit.
• The basic unit is the magnitude of the charge on the
proton, an amount equal to 1.6 x 10-19 C, where C stands
for coulomb, the SI unit of charge.
• This amount of charge is symbolized by e. The charge on
an electron is –e.
– Taking quarks into account as an even smaller charged particle,
the basic unit of charge would be But for the purposes of
electricity, we’ll stick to e and –e.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Properties of Electric Charge
• Another important property of charge is that it is conserved.
Like total energy of a system or the amount of matter in a
physical or chemical process, electric charge cannot be
created or destroyed.
• In any process the total charge of a system cannot change.
• In solid metals the atoms are
fixed in positions in a lattice, but
there are many free electrons
that do not belong to one
particular atom. These electrons
can move, carrying charge
through the metal.
• Materials with many “free” electrons are called conductors.
The opposite of conductors are insulators.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 The Tolman-Stewart Experiment
• When free electrons are exposed to an electric field, they
begin to drift in the same direction, creating an electric
current.
• Conclusive proof that the charge carriers in metals are
electrons came in 1916 in an experiment by R.C. Tolman
and T.D. Stewart.
• The idea for the experiment was that if the charge carriers
in a piece of metal were negative electrons, then they
should be floating freely inside the metal, whereas positive
protons would be fixed in position inside the nucleus of
each metal atom.
• Therefore, if the metal was very suddenly accelerated in
one direction, the electrons would be thrown back like a
person in a car without a seatbelt on.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 The Tolman-Stewart Experiment
• And if the electrons were thrown
backward by the acceleration of the
metal, they would create an excess
negative charge at the back of the
metal, leaving an excess positive
charge at the front – an extreme
demonstration of inertia!
• Tolman and Stewart were able to measure the excess
charges in the metal and found it to be consistent with the
idea that electrons were negative charge carriers within
metals.
• This is also consistent with another general property of
electric charge that only negative charges move.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Current
• In a conductor the “free” electrons move randomly, much
like gas molecules in a container or electrons moving
throughout an electron orbital cloud. They do this with high
speeds, of the order of 105 ms-1.
• This random motion, however, does not result in electric
current because there is no significant quantity of electrons
moving in the same direction at any given time.
• If an electric field is applied across the conductor, the free
electrons experience a force that pushes them in the
opposite direction to the direction of the field. (Opposite
because of the repulsive forces of like charges.)
• This motion of electrons in the same direction is a direct
current (dc), which will for now be referred to as “current.”
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Current
• We define electric current in a conductor as the rate of flow
of charge through its cross-section:
• The unit of electric current is the ampere (A or amp for
short), which is the flow of one coulomb of charge per
second. The ampere is one of the fundamental units of the
SI system of measurement.
• In the figure below, electrons are moving in a metallic wire.
The average speed with which the electrons move in the
direction opposite to the magnetic field is called the drift
speed, .
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Current
• How many electrons will move
through the cross-sectional area
of the wire (colored orange)
within time ?
• Those electrons that are far away from the orange cross-
section will not travel far enough. The distance covered by
electrons in a time interval is , and so only those electrons
withing the volume of the wire shaded pink will reach the
cross-sectional area in time.
• How many electrons are there in this volume? The shaded
volume is , where is the cross-sectional area of the wire.
• If there are electrons per unit volume, the number of
electrons is
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Current
• AND if each electron carries
charge , then the charge that
passes through the cross-
section is
• So
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Potential Difference
• In Chapter 18 we will learn that there are electric forces
between electric charges. The electric force is repulsive for
same sign charges (i.e., negative and negative) and
attractive for opposite sign charges.
• So if, for example, we want to move a positive charge
closer to another positive charge, work must be done.
• If the work done in moving a charge from A to B is , the ratio
is defined to be the potential difference between points A
and B.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Potential Difference
• Potential difference is the work done in moving the charge
divided by the charge of the particle.

• Conversely, if the charge at A is released, the electric force

will push it away and the charge will gain kinetic energy.
• At the point C the kinetic energy gained will be equal to
where is now the potential difference between A and C.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Potential Difference
• The potential difference V between two points is the work
done per unit charge to move a point charge from one point
to another.

• The unit of potential difference is the volt, V.

• 1 V = 1 J C-1.

Remember! To make a current

(electrons moving in the same
direction), you must have a
source of potential difference.
One way to do this is to connect
your electrical conductor to a cell
or a battery.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Resistance
• When a given potential difference is established at the ends
of a conductor, an electric current will be established in the
conductor.
• The size of the current depends on a property of the
conductor called its electric resistance.
• The electric resistance of a conductor is defined as the
potential difference across its ends divided by the current
through it.

• Perhaps a better way to remember this equation is , but

regardless, you will be required to instantly convert the
equation between , , and .
• The unit for electric resistance is the ohm Ω.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Resistance
• The electric resistance of conducting wires is very small, so
it is a good approximation to ignore this resistance.
• Conducting wires are represented by thin line segments in
diagrams.
• Conductors whose resistance cannot be ignored are
denoted by boxes and are called resistors.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Resistance
• In 1826, the German scientist Georg Ohm discovered that
when the temperature of most metallic conductors is kept
constant, the current through the conductor is proportional
to the potential difference across it.

• This statement is known as Ohm’s law.

• Materials that obey Ohm’s law (ohmic materials) have a
constant resistance at constant temperature.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Resistance
• For ohmic materials, a graph of against gives a straight line
through the origin.

• A filament light bulb will obey Ohm’s law if the current

through it is small.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Resistance
• As the current is increased, the temperature of the filament
increases, and so does the resistance.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Resistance
• In the original graph of the ohmic material, no matter which
point we choose (for example one with voltage 1.2 V and
current 1.6 mA), the resistance is always the same:

• However, if we look at the second graph (the lamp filament),

we see that at a voltage of 0.2 V the current is 0.8 mA and so
the resistance is:

• And at a voltage of 0.3 V the current is 1.0 mA and the

resistance is:

• We can see that the lamp filament is a nonohmic device

because the resistance does not remain constant.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Resistance
• As a general rule, in most metallic conductors an increase in
temperature leads to an increase in resistance.

• There are two common components with variable

resistance:
• Light dependent resistors (LDRs) decrease the resistance
as the intensity of light falling on it increases.
• An NTC-type thermistor decreases the resistance as the
ambient temperature increases.
IB Physics: Topic B.5 – Current & Circuits
B.5.1 Electric Resistance
• Experiments show that three factors affect the resistance of
a conductor kept at a constant temperature:
– the nature of the material
– the length of the conductor
– the cross-sectional area of the conductor
• It is found that the electric resistance of a conductor (at a
constant temperature) is proportional to its length and
inversely proportional to the cross-sectional area :

• The constant is called resistivity and depends on the

material of the conductor and the temperature. The unit of
resistivity is the Ω m.