Applied Circuit Analysis

Chapter 1 – Basic
Concepts

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 Circuit Theory
• Circuit theory is the basis upon which
many branches of electrical engineering
rests.
• For electrical engineering technology
education, circuit theory is the single
most important course taken.
• Virtually anything that is either plugged
into a wall outlet or runs off a battery can
be analyzed with circuit theory.

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 What is a circuit?
• An electric circuit is an interconnection of electrical elements.
• It may consist of only two elements or many more:

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 Units
• When taking
measurements, we must
use units to quantify
values
• We use the International
Systems of Units (SI for
short)
• Prefixes on SI units allow
for easy relationships
between large and small
values

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 SI Units
• Any measurement that is made must be
compared to a standard reference.
• This reference is called a ‘unit’ such as
kilograms or feet.
• Units are found everywhere and are
collected together in sets.
• The set that is recognized and used
across the world is the International
System (SI).
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SI Units II

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 Converting Units
• Despite the universally adopted SI
units, other sets of units exist.
• One often needs to change a measured
value from one set of units to another.
• This is done by multiplying or dividing
by a “conversion factor.”
• An example of this is that there are 60
seconds in a minute.

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 Converting Units II
• Let’s take an example of a time
measured to be 30 seconds.
• In this case, we have a conversion
factor of 60 seconds per minute.
• We need the seconds units to cancel,
therefore we divide by the factor:
1min
30sec   0.5min
60sec

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Conversion Factors

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 Scientific Notation
• Often engineers and scientists work with very
large or very small numbers.
• Writing them out fully is impractical.
• Instead, two notation methods exist for making
the numbers more manageable to write.
• In Scientific Notation the number is expressed
in powers of ten with a single digit to the left of
the decimal point.
• For example 6.02x1023

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 Engineering Notation
• Engineering notation differs slightly from
scientific notation.
• In this case, only powers of 10 that are
multiples of three are used
• i.e. 103, 106, 109,…
• A prefix is then attached to the unit to note
the power of ten used.
• This is almost exclusively used with SI
units.

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 SI Prefixes
• Here is a list of the
SI prefixes that are
typically found.

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 Electric Charge
• We know from elementary physics that
matter is made of atoms.
• Atoms consist of a nucleus and
electrons orbiting it.
• Although in solid matter the nuclei
don’t move much, in certain materials
the electrons can move freely between
atoms.

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 Electric Charge
• As such, the electric charge is what
allows any electronics to function.
• It is natural for anyone working in
electronics to use the charge of the
electron as a reference.
• But, due to historical reasons, the
electron is considered to have a
negative charge.

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 Charge
• Charge is a basic SI unit, measured in
Coulombs (C).
• Counts the number of electrons (or positive
charges) present.
• Charge of single electron is 1.602*10-19 C
• One Coulomb is quite large, 6.24*1018
electrons.

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 Charge II
• In the lab, one typically sees (pC, nC, or
μC).
• Charge is always multiple of electron
charge.
• Charge cannot be created or destroyed,
only transferred.

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 Current
• The movement of charge is called a current.
• Historically the moving charges were
thought to be positive.
• Thus we always note the direction of the
equivalent positive charges, even if the
moving charges are negative.

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 Current II
• Current, i, is measured as charge
moved per unit time through an
element.
Q
I
t
• Unit is Ampere (A), is one
Coulomb/second.

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 DC vs. AC
• A current that remains constant
with time is called Direct Current
(DC).
• Such current is represented by the
capital I, time varying current uses
the lowercase, i.
• A common source of DC is a
battery.
• A current that varies sinusoidally
with time is called Alternating
Current (AC).
• Mains power is an example of AC.

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 Direction of current
• The sign of the current indicates the
direction in which the charge is
moving with reference to the direction
of interest we define.
• We need not use the direction that the
charge moves in as our reference, and
often have no choice in the matter.

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 Direction of Current II
• A positive current through a
component is the same as a negative
current flowing in the opposite
direction.

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 Classes of Materials
• In terms of the ease in which a charge
can move through a material, we use
three categories for matter.
• Conductors: Such as copper, silver, or
gold easily allow electrons to pass
through.
• Semiconductors: Such as silicon and
germanium still allow electrons to pass,
but not as readily.

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 Classes of Materials II
• You will be familiar with semiconductors
such as silicon for their use in “chips.”
• Their operation is beyond the scope of this
course.
• Insulators: Such as rubber, wood, or
plastic do not allow electrons to pass
through.
• They obviously are important for isolating
charges.

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 Voltage
• Electrons move when there is a
difference in charge between two
locations.
• This difference is expressed at the
potential difference, or voltage (V).
• It is always expressed with reference to
two locations.

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 Voltage II
• It is equal to the energy, W, needed to
move a unit charge between the
locations.
W
Vab 
Q
• Positive charge moving from a higher
potential to a lower yields energy.
• Moving from negative to positive
requires energy.

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 Power and Energy
• Voltage alone does not equal power.
• It requires the movement of charge, i.e. a
current.
• Power is the product of voltage and current

P  VI
• It is equal to the rate of energy provided or
consumed per unit time.
• It is measured in Watts (W).

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 Passive Sign Convention
• By convention, we say that an
element being supplied power
has positive power.
• A power source, such as a
battery has negative power.
• Passive sign convention is
satisfied if the direction of
current is selected such that
current enters through the
terminal that is more positively
biased.

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 Conservation of Energy
• In a circuit, energy cannot be created or
destroyed.
• Thus power also must be conserved.
• The sum of all power supplied must be
absorbed by the other elements.
• Energy can be described as watts x time.
• Power companies usually measure
energy in watt-hours

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