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Static electricity is an imbalance of electric charges within or on the surface of a material. The charge remains until it can move away by an electric current or electrical discharge . The word "static" is used to differentiate it from current electricity , where an electric charge flows through an electrical conductor .
A Van de Graaff generator is an electrostatic generator which uses a moving belt to accumulate electric charge on a hollow metal globe on the top of an insulated column, creating very high electric potentials. It produces very high voltage direct current (DC) electricity at low current levels.
An electrostatic generator, or electrostatic machine, is an electrical generator that produces static electricity, or electricity at high voltage and low continuous current. The knowledge of static electricity dates back to the earliest civilizations, but for millennia it remained merely an interesting and mystifying phenomenon , without a ...
Electrostatics is a branch of physics that studies slow-moving or stationary electric charges. Since classical times, it has been known that some materials, such as amber, attract lightweight particles after rubbing. The Greek word for amber, ἤλεκτρον (ḗlektron), was thus the root of the word electricity.
[16] [18] He discovered that many more materials than amber such as sulphur, wax, glass could produce static electricity when rubbed, and that moisture prevented electrification. Others such as Sir Thomas Browne made important contributions slightly later, both in terms of materials and the first use of the word electricity in Pseudodoxia ...
Electroluminescence — The phenomenon wherein a material emits light in response to an electric current passed through it, or to a strong electric field. Electrostatic induction — Redistribution of charges in a conductor inside an external static electric field, such as when a charged object is brought close.
Static electricity has several applications. Its main application is in Van de Graaff generators, used to produce high voltages in order to test the dielectric strength of insulating materials. Other uses are in electrostatic painting and sandpaper manufacturing. The course grains acquire a negative charge as they move across the negative plate.
The electrons move until they reach the surface of the metal and collect there, where they are constrained from moving by the boundary. [3] The surface is the only location where a net electric charge can exist. [4]: p.754 This establishes the principle that electrostatic charges on conductive objects reside on the surface of the object.