5.2: Electric Fields
- Page ID
- 32672
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In the previous chapter you explored Coulomb's law, the law that describes the force between charges. In this chapter, we describe what happens to the space around an electric charge; specifically, that an electric field is created. The field approach allows us to describe the force a charged particle experiences as due to the presence of the electric field created by nearby charges. Operationally, an electric field is simply a description of the force (magnitude and direction) a positively charged object would experience divided by its charge (\(\mathbf{E} =\mathbf{F}/q\)). In the process of representing this vector field, we will use field vectors, field lines and "test charges" (charges that only feel the force due to other charges, but do not change the external electric field).