Question

Coulomb's Law: Coulomb's law is F = k (q1xq2)/ r^2 where k = 9 x 10^9 C^2/m^2. a) Sketch the charges and use Coulomb's law to determine the electric force between two charged particles where q1 = -5 x 10^-3 C and q2 = -1 x 10^-3 C. Q1 and Q2 are separated by a distance of 0.25 m. b) Determine whether the electric force attractive or repulsive and explain your answer?

Answer 1

a) F = 7.20 10⁵ N, b) the force between charges is repulsive.

Step-by-step explanation:

For this exercise we calculate the electric forces given by Coulomb's law

`F = k (q_(1) q_(2) )/(r^(2) )`

where in this case they indicate that q1 = 5 103 C and q2 = 1 103 C and the distance between them r = 0.25 m

let's calculate

F =
`9 10^(9) \ (5 \ 10^(-3) \ \ 1 \ 10^(-3) )/(0.25^(2) )`

F = 7.20 10⁵ N

b) when electric charges have the same sign they repel and when they have the opposite sign they attract.

In this case, charge 1 is negative and charge 2 is negative, therefore, since they both have the same sign, the force between charges is repulsive.