What is electricity?

[Special K]

What exactly is it? Can someone give me a good explanation or refer me to a website that does?

 

[pm]

It's an imbalance of electrons trying to balance itself.

 

[Special K]

how enlightening

 

[CoolTech]

too hard to open up a dictionary?

e·lec·tric·i·ty (-lk-trs-t, lk-)
n.

The physical phenomena arising from the behavior of electrons and protons that is caused by the attraction of particles with opposite charges and the repulsion of particles with the same charge.
The physical science of such phenomena.
Electric current used or regarded as a source of power.
Intense, contagious emotional excitement.

 

[Shalmanese]

Yeah, well, I think he was looking for something more than a dictionary quote. bad day cooltech?

Well, you can define electricity in lots of different ways, Electrical Energy is the energy arising from the movement of electrns from point A to point B leading to useful work being done.

Electricity could be defined as the flow of electrical Energy.

 

[IGBT]

Electron flow...

 

[Shalmanese]

Not neccesarily, in galvanic cells there is also a positive ion flow.

 

[Special K]

Nevermind, I found what I was looking for....

 

[pm]

<< Not neccesarily, in galvanic cells there is also a positive ion flow. >>

Conduction through "holes" always does my head in. Conceptually I can understand what it does and how it work and what effects it has, but intuitively it makes very little sense to me.

 

[JeremiahTheGreat]

uh.. just did this in physics.

Something like charge or something.. uh.. who cares. Exams are over

 

[chaswood]

The best way to start to understand electricity is to compare it to water. Voltage is the pressure behing the water and current (amperage) is the amount flowing through a pipe.

Attach a small hose to the bottom of a bucket of water. Lift the bucket of water higher and it increases the pressure which results in increasing the flow (current). This is like raising the voltage.

Placing a resistor in the line is like placing a restrictor in a water pipe, it decreases the flow.

The most basic law of electicity, Ohm's law, is:

Voltage equals Current times Resistance or V=I*R (I=V/R, R=V/I). Increasing the voltage increases current flow, increasing resistance decreases current flow.

Hope this helps. It is the starting point for understanding electricity.