THE NAZARETH ACADEMY

SENIOR SECONDARY CBSE SCHOOL.

PHYSICS INVESTIGATORY PROJECT

2024 - 2025

TO ESTIMATE THE CHARGE INDUCED

BY MAKING USING COULOMB’S LAW

Submitted by
SURIYA PRAKASH S.U- XI A

The Nazareth Academy

Kovilpathagai Main road,
Avadi, chennai-62
 BONAFIDE CERTIFICATE

REGISTER NUMBER 11128

This is to certify that this Physics Investigatory Project on the

Topic “To estimate the charge induced by making coulomb’s
law”, has been successfully completed by Suriya prakash S U
of Class XI-A under the guidance of Ms. Merlin dayana (PGT-
Physics) in particular fulfilment of the curriculum of Central
Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), leading to the award of
Annual Examination of the year 2024 – 2025.

Submitted for All India senior secondary school certificate

for practical examination held on ………..

Internal Examiner External Examiner

Signature of principal
 DECLARATION

I hereby declare that the project work entitled “To estimate the
charge induced by making use of coulomb’s law”, submitted
to Department of Physics, The Nazareth Academy .

Name: Suriya prakash S U Register no:1128

 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I have taken efforts in this project however it would not have been

possible without the kind support and help of many individuals.

I would like to thank my Principal and School for providing me with the

facilities required to do my project.

I am highly indebted to Ms.A.MERLIN DAYANA, PGT- Physics for

her invaluable guidance which has sustained my efforts in all the stages

of this project work.

A special thanks to Ms.K.HILDA JOY for supporting me in the

completion of this project. I am grateful for the efforts she has made to

clarify my doubts.

I wish to acknowledge the constant encouragement of my family and

my friends who have always been my moral support and source of

felicity.
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

S.No Content Page No.

1. Introduction 01
2. Coulomb’s law 02
3. Electrical charge 03
4. aim 04
5. Materials required 04
6. theory 05
7. procedure 06
8. observation 06
9. calculation 06
10. Source of error 07
11. Bibliography 08
 INTORDUCTION

Coulomb graduated in November 1761 from École royale dugénie de Mézières.

Over the next twenty years he was posted to a variety of locations where he was
involved in engineering -structural, fortifications, soil mechanics, as well as other
fields of engineering. His first posting was to Brest but in February 1764he was
sent to Martinique, in the West Indies, where he was put in charge of building the
new Fort Bourbon and this task occupied him until June 1772.

On his return to France, Coulomb was sent to Bouchain. However, he now began
to write important works on applied mechanics and he presented his first work to
the Académie des Sciences in Paris in 1773. In 1779 Coulomb was sent
toRochefort to collaborate with the Marquis de Montalembert in constructing a
fort made entirely from wood near Ile d'Aix. During his period at Rochefort,
Coulomb carried on his research into mechanics, in particularusing the shipyards
in Rochefort as laboratories for his experiments.
Upon his return to France, with the rank of Captain, he was employed at La
Rochelle, the Isle of Aix and Cherbourg. He discovered an inverse relationship of
the force between electric charges and the square of its distance, later named after
him as Coulomb's law.
 COULOMB’S LAW
In 1785 Augustine de Coulomb investigated the attractive and repulsive
forces between charged objects, experimentally formulating what is now
referred to as Coulomb’s Law :“The magnitude of the electric force that a
particle exerts on another is directly proportional to the product of their
charges and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between
them.”
Mathematically, this electrostatic F acting on two charged particles (q1, q2)
is expressed as
where r is the separation distance between the objects and k is a constant of
proportionality, called the Coulomb constant, k =9×109Nm2/C2.

This formula gives us the magnitude of the force as well as direction by

noting a positive force as attractive and a negative force as repulsive. Noting
that like charges repel each other and opposite charges attracting each other,
Coulomb measured the force between the objects, small metal coated balls,
by using a torsion balance similar to the balance used to

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 ELECTRIC CHARGES
Historically the credit of discovery of the fact that amber rubbed with wool
or silk cloth attracts light objects goes to Thales of Miletus, Greece, around
600 BC. The name electricity is coined from the Greek word elektron
meaning amber. The experiments on pith balls suggested that there are two
kinds of electrification and we find that (i) like charges repel and (ii) unlike
charges attract each other. The experiments also demonstrated that the
charges are transferred from the rods to the pith balls on contact. It is said
that the pith balls are electrified or are charged by contact. The property
which differentiates the two kinds of charges is called the polarity of charge.
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.
.Electric charge is a physical property of matter which causes objects to
experience a force when it is placed in an electric field.
.Protons carry a positive charge and electrons carry a negative charge.
.An ion is an atom that has either gained or lost electrons.
. A point charge is defined as a charged object whose size is negligible
compared to the distance between other charges in the system. This means
that when we consider the effects of the charge, we treat it as if all of its
charge is concentrated at a single point in space. Coulombs are the units of
charge.
electric charge, basic property of matter carried by some elementary particles
that governs how the particles are affected by an electric or magnetic field.
Electric charge, which can be positive or negative, occurs in discrete natural
units and is neither created nor destroyed.

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 EXPERIMENT
AIM:
To estimate the charge induced on each of the two identical
styrofoam (or pith) balls suspended in a vertical plane by making
use of coulomb’s law.

MATERIAL REQUIRED:

Small size identical balls (pitch or soft plastic)

• Physical balance or electronic balance

•Half meter Scale

•Cotton thread

• Stand

•Glass rod (or plastic rod)

• Silk cloth (or woolen cloth)

THEORY:

3
The fundamental concept in electrostatics is electrical charge. We
are all familiar with the fact that rubbing two materials together
— for example, a rubber comb on cat fur
—produces a “static”
Charge .This process is called charging by friction. Surprisingly ,the
exact physics of the process of charging by friction is poorly
understood. However, it is known that the making and breaking of
The charged particles which make up the universe come in three
kinds: positive, negative, and neutral. Neutral particles do not
interact with electrical forces. Charged particles exert electrical and
magnetic forces on one another, but if the charges are stationary, the
mutual force is very simple in form and is given by Coulomb's Law:
contact between the two materials transfers the charge.
where F is the electrical force between any two stationarycharged
particles with charges q1 and q2(measured in coulombs),r is the
separation between the charges (measured in meters),and k is a
constant of nature (equal to 9×109Nm2/C2 in SI units).
The study of the Coulomb forces among arrangements of stationary
charged particles is called electrostatics. Coulomb's Law describes
three properties of the electrical force:
The study of the Coulomb forces among arrangements of stationary
charged particles is called electrostatics. Coulomb's Law describes
three properties of the electrical force:
1.The force is inversely proportional to the square of the distance
between the charges, and is directed along the straight line that
connects their centers.
2.The force is proportional to the product of the magnitude of the
charges.
4
 3.Two particles of the same charge exert a repulsive force on each
other, and two particles of opposite charge exert an attractive force
on each other.
Materials such as metals are conductors. Each metal atom
contributes one or two electrons that can move relatively freely
through the material. A conductor will carry an electrical current.
Other materials such as glass are insulators. Their electrons are
bound tightly and cannot move. Charge sticks on an insulator, but
does not move freely through it.
A neutral particle is not affected by electrical forces. Never the
less,a charged object will attract a neutral macroscopic object by the
process of electrical polarization. For example, if a negatively
charged rod is brought close to an isolated, neutral insulator, the
electrons in the atoms of the insulator will be pushed slightly away
from the negative rod, and the positive nuclei will be attracted
slightly toward the negative rod. We say that the rod has induced
polarization in the insulator, but its net charge is still zero.
If the negative rod is brought near an isolated, neutral conductor ,the
conductor will also be polarized. In the conductor, electrons are free
to move through the material, and some of them are repelled over to
the opposite surface of the conductor, leaving the surface near the
negative rod with a net positive charge. The conductor has been
polarized, and will now be attracted to the charged rod.
PROCEDURE:
1. Measure the mass (m) of each of the two identical pith balls using a
physical balance.
2. Hang the two balls from a rigid support using light silk or cotton threads
of same length ‘l’.

5
3. Rub the glass tod silk cloth to induce charge on it. Now touch the glass
rod with both the pith balls together so that equal charge is induced on both
the balls.
4. When left freely, the two balls will repel each other. Measure the distance
between the balls when are at rest. Note down the distance.
5. To change the charge on ball, take third uncharged ball touch it to any one
of the two balls and take the third ball away, and repeat step 4.
6. Take other uncharged suspended with other uncharged 4th ball and take
the 4th ball away and repeat step 4.
OBSERVATION:
.Mass of the pith balls m = ____ gm.
.Radius of the ball a = ____ cm.
.Length of thread l = ____ cm
CALCULATION:
By using the relation q=mgx3/2lk
Calculate the charge in each case:
RESULT:
The charge on each ball = _______C.
PRECAUTIONS:
1.The suspended balls should not be touched by any conducting body.
2.Rub the glass rod properly with the silk cloth to produce more charge.
3.Weight the mass of the balls accurately.

SOURCE OF ERROR:
1.The suspended balls should not be touched by any conducting body.

2.Rub the glass rod properly with the silk cloth to produce more charge.
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3. Weight the mass of the balls accurately.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:
➢http://www.ncert.nic.in

➢https://www.wikipedia.org

➢https://www.quora.com

➢https://www.scribd.com