Static Electricity

E precisething is made up of exact particles c solelyed atoms. The atoms are made up of all the same smaller parts called protons, electrons and neutrons. Protons prevail a dogmatic ailment (+), electrons gravel a disallow thrill (-) and neutrons get no charge at all, they are neutral. Atoms normally have the same amount of electrons and protons, making them neutral and having no charge. When rubbing things together, electrons commode prevail from one atom to an early(a), resulting in some atoms having extra electrons and a negative charge.The other atoms now have to a greater extent protons than electrons and a positive charge. When the charges are separated, it is static electricity. Electricity is present in all exit in the form of electrons and protons. Any device that develops and maintains a voltage potentiometer be considered a voltage source. To accomplish this, the voltage source moldiness remove electrons from one point and transfer electrons to a second poin t. (Petruzella, 2001. ) i type of electricity is static electricity. The term static means rest still which makes static electricity an electric charge that is at rest.Static electricity is defined as an accumulation of electric charge on an insulated body. ( large-minded Dictionary) In other words, it is a charge that is created when deuce objectives that are not corking galvanic conductors are rubbed together, and electrons from one of the object rub off onto the other object. Some of the results of static electricity whitethorn be sparks, shocks, or even veridicals touching together. The simplest way to form static electricity is by friction. Friction is merely the rubbing of one object against another.By rubbing two different materials together, electrons may be forced out of their valence shells in one material and picked up in the shell of the other material. The material that gives up electrons more freely becomes positively charged and the one that gains electrons becomes negatively charged. (Petruzella, 2001. ) When the electrons are resettled from one material to another, it is called triboelectric charging. Static electricity is formed much discover in areas with low humidity and dry ambience. With humid air, trivial pissing molecules sewer collect on the surface of different materials and prevent the buildup of an electrical charge.Although small amounts of water, such as those developed from humidity, can affect a charge, extreme turbulence among water drops, such as in a thunderstorm cloud, can take a leak static electricity to build up on the water droplets themselves. Benjamin Franklin showed that static electricity is created in a thunderstorm cloud by flying a kite during a storm. He noticed the static electricity by seeing the sensory hairs on the kite stand on end and created an electric spark with a metal key. There are other ways to lift a static charge other than friction or contact.An object can similarly be charg ed by induction. Induction is used to p celestial poleuce a charge of opposite polarity. Inductance is defined in the text edition as an electrical property which opposes alteration in current. (Petruzella, 2001. ) An inductor is a device that generates a counter emf that tends to oppose any change in current done the use of ac current period through a coil wire. (Petruzella, 2001. ) Charging by induction makes use of the electrostatic field surrounding a charged body in site to charge an object without touch sensation it.If a negatively charged magnetic pole is brought close to the sphere on the inductor, the negative charges in the sphere move as far away from the rod as possible. By touching the sphere, it is grounded and allows the electrons to completely leave the sphere. Once you remove your finger, the electrons no longer have a way of returning to the sphere and the rod is therefore positively charged. Static electrical charge can be produced by a high-voltage dir ect current source. Many air purifiers use two positively and negatively charged plates to remove tiny dirt particles from the air.This arranging uses an electrostatic precipitator and oppositely charged grids. The dirty air moves through the precipitator which gives the dirt particles a positive charge. All of those particles are then inveigleed to the negatively charged grid and then the air passes through a carbon filter to remove any odors. Static electricity is also used with photography to work a photocopier. An electrostatically charged trounce attracts toner particles to the propose in the original document. The metal drum inside the auto is charged at the eginning of for each one copy. The system inside the photocopier then puts an image of the document onto the drum. The electric charge goes away wherever light shines on the drum and so only the dark parts of the image are still charged on the metal surface. The particles of black toner are oppositely charged and the n applied to the drum. The charged parts, which contain the image, are attracted to the toner and transferred to the melodic theme and finally attached to the paper with heat. Static electricity can cause materials to attract or repel each other.If you use a hair dried on your hair and then comb through it or just comb it on a very dry day, the bendable comb leave collect negative charges from the hair and leave the hair with an overmuch amount of positive charges. Since like charges repel, the hair strands will affect away from each other causing your hair to stand up or flyaway. Static electricity can also cause a spark to jump from one material to another, like when you touch soulfulness and shock them. As you walk across something like a carpet, electrons cling to you.When you have extra electrons, you then have a negative charge and are attracted to positive charges so once you touch someone else, assuming they have a positive charge, you will feel a tiny shock which i s a quick movement of electrons. If there are comely positive electrical charges on one object or material and enough negative charges on another, the attraction may be so great that the electrons will jump to the other object with out the two touching. After a few electrons make the jump, the air begins to heat up and causes more and more electrons to move and the air to get even hotter.This all happens so fast and causes the air to get so hot that it glows for a split second and is know as a spark. The same do by occurs with lightning only on a much larger scale. Removing or preventing a static charge can be very simple such as opening a window or using an air humidifier to increase the moisture content of the air and make the atmosphere more conductive. (Wikipedia) Items that are very dainty to static discharge can be treated with an antistatic agent. Wikipedia defines an antistatic agent as something that adds a conducting urface layer which ensures that any excess charge is evenly distributed. An example of an antistatic agent is fabric softener or dryer sheets which are used in your laundry to prevent and remove static cling. Semiconductor devices which are used in electronics are very sensitive to static charge. These devices are protected using antistatic bags and those who work with these devices ground themselves by wearing conductive antistatic straps to protect their bodies. To test for a charge on an object, you must see how that object affects another object with a known charge.If the two objects repel, that means their charges are alike and if they attract, the charges are opposite. To see if an object is neutral, test it with another neutral object. Neutral objects do not attract with each other, only with another positive or negative object. An aluminum- hitchhike electroscope is a device for detecting the presence of an electric charge and also for find whether the charge is positive or negative. (Petruzella, 2001. ) This device is mad e up of a flask with an insulating spark plug. A metal rod goes through the center of the stopper and a metal knob is fastened to the outside end of the rod.Two very thin pieces of aluminum are attached to the other end of the rod inside the flask. Normally the positive and negative charges within the electroscope balance each other, leaving it neutral. When a negatively charged body touches the knob of the electroscope, electrons prey from the charged body into the knob and down to the aluminum leaves. Each leaf then becomes negatively charged. Since like charges repel and both leaves are negative, they will diverge, indicating that the object contained a static charge. (Petruzella, 2001. )In conclusion, static electricity is all well-nigh us. It may clean our air or be the cause of a terrible hair day but has both positive and negative effects on many daily routines.Work Cited Page Petruzella, Frank. Essentials of Electronics. Second Ed. Columbus, OH Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, 2001. 39-43. Print. Kurtus, Ron. basics of Static Electricity. School for Champions. N. p. , 23 Jan 2009. Web. 17 Oct 2010. . Definition of Static Electricity. The Free Dictionary. Houghton Mifflin, 2000. Web. 20 Oct 2010. . Static Electricity. Wikipedia. N. p. , 16 Oct 2010. Web. 17 Oct 2010. .