Static Electricity and Electrostatic Induction

Electrostatics or static electrostatic: Electrostatics is the branch of Electrical Engineering and Physics which deals with the electricity in it’s static electricity form.

Static Electricity:

Electricity in general is thought of a flow of electrons, But matters which does not have a flow of electron can also posses electrical characteristics and properties.

Static electricity can be understood clearly by using the analogy of classical mechanics; Think of the energy and force possessed by a body! There are two kinds of energy; the first Kinetic energy which is due to the moving state of a body and the second is potential energy which is due to the virtue of it’s state. Static Electricity is comparable to the potential energy.  While the Dynamic Electricity is due to the movement of electrons in an object or conductor, Static electricity is due to the state of charge of the substance.

We all know that an atom is electrically neutral because of equal numbers of proton and electron, But somehow if we add some extra electrons to the atom then the atom is negatively charged and if we take some electrons out then the atom then the atom is positively charged. The energy possessed by a substance because of it’s virtue of charge is called the Static Electricity.

example of static charge

 

In the figure above, The contact of the children’s body with the slide charged the child’s hair positively, because of which the positively charged hair particles are repelling each other. The hair posses static electricity.

Electrostatic Induction

If a positively charged conducting body( let “A”) is brought near to another conducting body without any charge (“B”). The free electrons of the conductor body “B” will be caused to drift in a direction opposite to that of the electric field produced by the charged body “A”. This will produce two end regions in the body “B” , one end being positively charged and another end being negatively charged.  This phenomenon of induction or separation of charges on a conducting body due to the action of another charged body is called electrostatic induction.
electrostatic induction

The two opposite charges induced in the conducting body are called two bound charges.
If, one of the end of the conducting body is connected to the earth then one of the bound charge will go away leaving behind only one bound charge as shown in the figure:
example of electrostatic induction