Question

What is the electric potential at a point midway between two charges, -4.11 microC and -8.06 microC, separated by 21.94 cm?

Answer 1

The electric potential of a point charge is given by:

`V=k(q)/(r)`

where q is the charge and r is the distance between the charge and the point of interest. In this case we have two charges, then to calculate the total potential on a point we need to add the individual potential of each charge.

For both charges the point of interest is at 0.1097 m, then we have:

`\begin{gathered} V=(9*10^9)((-4.11*10^(-6))/(0.1097))+(9*10^9)((-8.06*10^(-6))/(0.1097)) \\ V=-0.997*10^6 \end{gathered}`

Therefore, the electric potential midway of the charges is:

`V=-0.997*10^6\text{ V}`