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Electric charge (symbol q, sometimes Q) is a physical property of matter that causes it to experience a force when placed in an electromagnetic field. Electric charge can be positive or negative. Like charges repel each other and unlike charges attract each other. An object with no net charge is referred to as electrically neutral.
Charge quantization is the principle that the charge of any object is an integer multiple of the elementary charge. Thus, an object's charge can be exactly 0 e, or exactly 1 e, −1 e, 2 e, etc., but not 1 / 2 e, or −3.8 e, etc. (There may be exceptions to this statement, depending on how "object" is defined; see below.)
Linear charge density (λ) is the quantity of charge per unit length, measured in coulombs per meter (C⋅m −1), at any point on a line charge distribution. Charge density can be either positive or negative, since electric charge can be either positive or negative. Like mass density, charge density can vary with position.
When charged particles move in electric and magnetic fields the following two laws apply: Lorentz force law: = (+),; Newton's second law of motion: = =; where F is the force applied to the ion, m is the mass of the particle, a is the acceleration, Q is the electric charge, E is the electric field, and v × B is the cross product of the ion's velocity and the magnetic flux density.
Related to the Faraday constant is the "faraday", a unit of electrical charge. Its use is much less common than of the coulomb, but is sometimes used in electrochemistry. [4] One faraday of charge is the charge of one mole of elementary charges (or of negative one mole of electrons), that is, 1 faraday = F × 1 mol = 9.648 533 212 331 001 84 × ...
The charges must have a spherically symmetric distribution (e.g. be point charges, or a charged metal sphere). The charges must not overlap (e.g. they must be distinct point charges). The charges must be stationary with respect to a nonaccelerating frame of reference. The last of these is known as the electrostatic approximation. When movement ...
Continuous charge distribution. The volume charge density ρ is the amount of charge per unit volume (cube), surface charge density σ is amount per unit surface area (circle) with outward unit normal n̂, d is the dipole moment between two point charges, the volume density of these is the polarization density P.
In physics, a charge is any of many different quantities, such as the electric charge in electromagnetism or the color charge in quantum chromodynamics. Charges correspond to the time-invariant generators of a symmetry group , and specifically, to the generators that commute with the Hamiltonian .