In this lab you will be investigating the nature of the electric field. You will

Question

In this lab you will be investigating the nature of the electric field. You will be using an electric field mapping apparatus in this laboratory. Mere we will ask you to make a few predictions based on what you know at this time about what you expect. You will be asked later to comment. Below are two different electrode diagrams that you will investigate in the lab. Please make a prediction on what you expect to observe in the electric field. You will have to read the lab to make this prediction. What do the electric fields produced by charged conductors look like? You do not have to worry about numbers here. We just want to establish some idea of what to expect. In two separate paragraphs describe the reasoning for each of the sketches you made of the field lines above.

Explanation / Answer

Electric field lines are lines where if a positive charge is placed, it will be accelerated in the direction of field lines.

For a positive point charge, the Electric field lines are diverging radially outwards from the charge and for a negative charge, the Electric field lines are converging radially inwards to the charge.

Therefore, the circular electrodes individually will have radially converging/diverging electric field lines depending on the charge on them. If they are now brought close to each other, the field lines will emerge from the positively charged circular electrode and end on the negatively charged electrode. And so the electric field lines will be curved in nature starting from positive electrode and ending on negative electrode.

For parallel plates Electric field grid, the entire plate is maintained at constant potential. Thus, the electric field lines emerging from the positive electrode will not diverge like the circular electrode but instead, will be parallel to each other. These lines will terminate on the negative electrode while still being parallel [since the negative electrode plate is also maintained at a constant potential].

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