ELECTRICITY

Electric Current
Potential difference & Power
Resistance & Resistivity

Sivakumar Y Thangam
ELECTRIC COMPONENTS & SYMBOLS
According to the standard IEC 60617
ELECTRIC CURRENT
The direction of the current is from the positive
terminal of the cell, around the circuit to the
negative terminal. This is a scientific convention:
the direction of current is from positive to
negative, and hence the current may be referred
to as conventional current.

What’s happening inside

the metal?
 When the cell is connected to the wire, it exerts an
ELECTRIC electrical force on the conduction electrons that
makes them travel along the length of the wire.
CURRENT Since electrons are negatively charged, they flow
away from the negative terminal of the cell and
towards the positive terminal. This is in the opposite
direction to conventional current.

How are appliances

start operating instantly
when the switch is
Connect the terminals of a cell to the two ends of a
wire and we have a complete circuit. The cell turned on?
produces an electric field in the wire; the field lines
are along the wire, from the positive terminal to the
negative. This means that there is a force on each
electron in the wire, so each electron starts to move
and the current exists almost instantly.
Are electrons the only
carrier of current ?

✓ Sometimes a current is a flow of

positive charges–for example, a
beam of protons produced in a
particle accelerator.
✓ Sometimes a current is due to
both positive and negative
charges.
✓ These charged particles are
known as charge carriers. If you consider the structure of charged
particles you will appreciate that charge
comes in definite sized ‘bits’; the smallest bit
being the charge on an electron or on a
single proton. This ‘bittiness’ is what is meant
Electric current is a flow when charge is described as being quantised.
of charge carriers.
 The charge on charge
carriers is quantized.

✓ Electrons each carry a tiny

negative charge of approximately
1.6 x 10−19 C.
This charge is represented by −e. This charge is so tiny that you would
need about six million million million
The magnitude of the charge is electrons – that’s 6 000 000 000 000 000
known as the elementary charge. 000 of them – to have a charge
✓ Protons are positively charged, with equivalent to one coulomb.
a charge +e. This is equal and
opposite to that of an electron.
✓ Ions carry charges that are
multiples of +e and −e.
 Electric current is a flow of charge carriers.

o When charged particles flow past a point in a circuit, we say that there
is a current in the circuit.
o Electrical current is measured in amperes (A).
o For a current of 1 A, the rate at which charge passes a point in a circuit
is 1 C in a time of 1 s.
o Electric current is the measure of rate of flow of charge at a point in a
circuit.
𝒄𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒈𝒆
𝒄𝒖𝒓𝒓𝒆𝒏𝒕 =
𝒕𝒊𝒎𝒆
∆𝑸
𝑰=
∆𝒕

Basically, what is
electric current??
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Q.No. 3
Q.No. 4
Q.No. 5
Q.No. 10
AN EQUATION FOR CURRENT

𝐼 = 𝑛𝐴𝑣𝑞
I → electric current (A)
n → number density, the number of conduction electrons
per unit volume (𝒎−𝟑 )
A → cross –sectional area of the wire (𝒎𝟐 )
v → mean drift velocity of the charge carriers (𝒎𝒔−𝟏 )
q → the charge on each charge carrier (C)

q = number of charge carriers x elementary charge

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Q.No. 12
Calculate the mean drift velocity of the electrons in a copper wire of cross-sectional area 5.0 × 𝟏𝟎−𝟔 𝒎𝟐
carrying a current of 1.0 A. The electron number density for copper is 8.5 × 𝟏𝟎𝟐𝟖 𝒎−𝟑.
 Slow Flow
❑ It may surprise you to find that electrons in a copper wire drift at a fraction
of a millimetre per second.
❑ To understand this result fully, we need to closely examine how electrons
behave in a metal.
❑ The conduction electrons are free to move around inside the metal.
❑ When the wire is connected to a battery or an external power supply,
each electron within the metal experiences an electrical force that
causes it to move towards the positive end of the battery.
❑ The electrons randomly collide with the fixed but vibrating metal ions. Their
journey along the metal is very haphazard.
❑ The actual velocity of an electron between collisions is of the order of
magnitude 10 5 m s−1, but its haphazard journey causes it to have a drift
velocity towards the positive end of the battery.
❑ Since there are billions of electrons, we use the term mean drift velocity v
of the electrons.
 𝐼
𝐼 = 𝑛𝐴𝑣𝑞 v=
𝑛𝐴𝑞

✓ Metals have a high electron

number density–typically of the
v∝𝐼 order of 1028 or 1029 𝑚−3.
✓ Semiconductors, such as silicon
and germanium, have much
1 lower values of n–perhaps
1023 𝑚−3. In a semiconductor,
v∝ electron mean drift velocities
𝐴 are typically a million times
greater than those in metals for
the same current.
1 ✓ Electrical insulators, such as
v∝ rubber and plastic, have very
𝑛 few conduction electrons per
unit volume to act as charge
carriers.
EMF & POTENTIAL DIFFERENCE
 EMF & POTENTIAL DIFFERENCE

Potential difference, V, is defined as the energy

transferred per unit charge.
The potential difference between two points, A
and B, is the energy transferred per unit charge as
it moves from point A to point B
𝒆𝒏𝒆𝒓𝒈𝒚 𝒕𝒓𝒂𝒏𝒔𝒇𝒆𝒓𝒓𝒆𝒅
𝒑𝒐𝒕𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒂𝒍 𝒅𝒊𝒇𝒇𝒆𝒓𝒆𝒏𝒄𝒆 =
𝒄𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒈𝒆
∆𝑾
𝑽=
∆𝑸

The electromotive force (e.m.f.), E, of the supply is also defined as the energy
transferred per unit charge.
However, the e.m.f. of a source is the energy transferred per unit charge in
driving charge around a complete circuit.
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Q.No. 2
Q.No. 7
Q.No. 8
Q.No. 11
ELECTRICAL RESISTANCE
The resistance of any component is defined as the ratio of the
potential difference to the current.
𝑝𝑜𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑎𝑙 𝑑𝑖𝑓𝑓𝑒𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒
𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑐𝑒 =
𝑐𝑢𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑉 𝑉 = 𝐼𝑅
𝑅=
𝐼
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Q.No. 6
Q.No.15
ELECTRICAL POWER
The rate at which energy is transferred is known as power.
Power P is measured in watts (W).
𝑒𝑛𝑒𝑟𝑔𝑦 𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑛𝑠𝑓𝑒𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑑
𝑝𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 =
𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑒 𝑡𝑎𝑘𝑒𝑛

∆𝑊 ∆𝑊 = 𝑉∆𝑄
𝑃=
∆𝑡 𝑉 = 𝐼𝑅
2
𝑉∆𝑄 2
𝑉
𝑃= 𝑃 = 𝑉𝐼 𝑃=𝐼 𝑅=
∆𝑡 𝑅
 CALCULATING ELECTRICAL ENERGY

Energy = power x time Power = current x voltage

Energy = current x voltage x time

𝑊 = 𝑉𝐼∆𝑡
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Q.No. 1
Q.No. 9
Q.No. 13
Q.No. 14
THE I–V CHARACTERISTIC FOR A METALLIC CONDUCTOR &
OHM’S LAW
• The graph is a straight line passes through
the origin.
• In other words, the current I is directly
proportional to the voltage V.
• The straight-line graph passing through the
origin shows that the resistance of the
conductor remains constant, which is the
ratio of the voltage to the current:
𝑉 1
𝑅= =
𝐼 𝑔𝑟𝑎𝑑𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑡

Ohm’s Law:
For a metallic conductor at constant
temperature, the current in it is directly
proportional to the p.d. across it.

Any component that behaves like this is

described as an ohmic component, and we say
that it obeys Ohm’s law.
RESISTANCE AND TEMPERATURE – FILAMENT LAMP

✓ A conductor that does not obey

Ohm’s law is described as non-
ohmic.

✓ An example is a filament lamp.

✓ you can clearly see the wire

filament glowing as the current
passes through it.
RESISTANCE AND TEMPERATURE – FILAMENT LAMP
✓ The line passes through the origin (as for an
ohmic component). For very small currents
and voltages, the graph is roughly a
straight line.
✓ At higher voltages, the line starts to curve.
The gradient is decreasing at higher
voltages. This means that the resistance has
increased.
✓ The graph is not a straight line–this shows
that the resistance of the lamp depends on
the temperature of its filament.
✓ Its resistance may increase by a factor as
large as ten between when it is cold and
when it is brightest (when its temperature
may be as high as 1750 °C)
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Q.No. 3
RESISTANCE AND TEMPERATURE –
THERMISTOR
✓ Thermistors are components that are designed to have a resistance that
changes rapidly with temperature.
✓ Thermistors (‘thermal resistors’) are made from metal oxides such as those
of manganese and nickel.
✓ There are two different types of thermistor:
o Negative temperature coefficient (NTC) thermistors – the resistance of this
type of thermistor decreases with increasing temperature. Those
commonly used for physics teaching may have a resistance of many
thousands of ohms at room temperature, falling to a few tens of ohms at
100 °C. You should become familiar with the properties of NTC thermistors.
o Positive temperature coefficient (PTC) thermistors–the resistance of this
type of thermistor rises abruptly at a definite temperature, usually around
100–150 °C. In this course, you only need to know about NTC thermistors.
So, whenever thermistors are mentioned, assume that it refers to an NTC
thermistor.
RESISTANCE AND TEMPERATURE – THERMISTOR
✓ The change in their resistance with temperature
gives thermistors many uses.
✓ Examples include:
o water temperature sensors in cars and ice sensors
on aircraft wings – if ice builds up on the wings, the
thermistor ‘senses’ this temperature drop and a
small heater is activated to melt the ice
o baby breathing monitors–the baby rests on an air-
filled pad, and as he or she breathes, air from the
pad passes over a thermistor, keeping it cool; if the
baby stops breathing, the air movement stops, the
thermistor warms up and an alarm sounds fire
In this course, you only need to sensors – a rise in temperature activates an alarm
know about NTC thermistors. o overload protection in electric razor sockets – if the
So, whenever thermistors are
mentioned, assume that it
razor overheats, the thermistor’s resistance
refers to an NTC thermistor. decreases, the current increases rapidly and cuts off
the circuit.
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Q.No. 2
Q.No. 4
Q.No. 7
DIODE – SEMICONDUCTOR COMPONENT (NON-OHMIC)

✓ A diode is any component that allows

electric current in only one direction.

✓ Most diodes are made of semiconductor

materials.

✓ One type, the light-emitting diode or LED,

gives out light when it conducts.
DIODE – SEMICONDUCTOR COMPONENT (NON-OHMIC) –
I-V CHARACTERISTICS ✓ when connected one way round, forward-biased,
the diode conducts and has a fairly low
resistance.
✓ Connected the other way round, reverse-biased,
it allows only a tiny current and has almost infinite
resistance.
✓ For positive voltages less than about 0.6 V, the
current is almost zero and hence the diode has
almost infinite resistance. It starts to conduct
suddenly at its threshold voltage.
✓ The resistance of the diode decreases
dramatically for voltages greater than 0.6 V
(silicon based).
✓ The resistance of a diode depends on the
potential difference across it. From this we can
conclude that it does not obey Ohm’s law; it is a
non-ohmic component.
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Q.No. 10
LIGHT DEPENDENT RESISTOR (LDR)

✓ A light-dependent resistor (LDR) is made of a

high-resistance semiconductor.

✓ If light falling on the LDR is of a high enough

frequency, photons are absorbed by the
semiconductor. As some photons are
absorbed, electrons are released from
atoms in the semiconductor. The resulting
free electrons conduct electricity and the
resistance of the semiconductor is reduced.
 RESISTIVITY – CHARACTERISTIC PROPERTY OF THE MATERIAL
✓ For a metal in the shape
For constant temperature,
of a wire, R depends on
the following factors: • 𝑅∝𝐿
1
• length L • 𝑅∝
𝐴
• cross-sectional area A
• the material the wire is 𝐿 𝜌𝐿
𝑅𝐴
made from • 𝑅∝ ;𝑅= 𝜌=
𝐴 𝐴 𝐿
• the temperature of the
wire.
RESISTIVITY OF MATERIALS AT 20𝑜 𝐶

Resistivity, like
resistance, depends
on temperature. For
a metal, resistivity
increases with
temperature. This is
because there are
more frequent
collisions between
the conduction
electrons and the
vibrating ions of the
metal.
 UNDERSTANDING THE ORIGIN OF RESISTANCE

This suggests there are two factors that

affect the resistance of a metal:
• the temperature
• the presence of impurities.
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