Answer Qn1 a, b Phys 212 Tutorial 04Electric Potential Name:1. What is U for these distributions [how many interactions are there]?a) Three charges are on the corners of an equilateral triangle with sides of length a. All have thesame magnitude charge q; two are positive and one is negative.a+,b) Four charges are on the corners of a square of length a. All have the same magnitude chargeq; three are positive and one is negative.aa

Answered: 1. What is U for these distributions…

College Physics

1st Edition

ISBN:9781938168000

Author:Paul Peter Urone, Roger Hinrichs

Publisher:Paul Peter Urone, Roger Hinrichs

Chapter18: Electric Charge And Electric Field

Section: Chapter Questions

Problem 26PE: (a) Two point charges q1 and q23.00 m apart, and their total charge is 20 C. (a) If the force of...

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Answer Qn1 a, b

Phys 212 Tutorial 04
Electric Potential Name:
1. What is U for these distributions [how many interactions are there]?
a) Three charges are on the corners of an equilateral triangle with sides of length a. All have the
same magnitude charge q; two are positive and one is negative.
a
+,
b) Four charges are on the corners of a square of length a. All have the same magnitude charge
q; three are positive and one is negative.
a
a

Expert Solution

Step 1

We are taking U to be the potential energy of the system.

(a)

The potential energy of the system is equal to the sum of the potential energies between the individual charges.

The potential energy of the system is given by

$\begin{array}{rcl} U & = & U_{+ +} + U_{+ -} + U_{+ -} \\ = & \frac{k q q}{a} + \frac{k q (- q)}{a} + \frac{k q (- q)}{a} \\ = & \frac{k q^{2}}{a} - 2 \frac{k q^{2}}{a} \\ = & - \frac{k q^{2}}{a} \end{array}$

Here, $U_{+ +}$ is the potential energy due to the two positive charges, $U_{+ -}$ is the potential energy due to +q and (-q) and k is the Coulomb constant.

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