Charge is a fundamental property of matter that drives the flow of electricity. Whether it's positive or negative, the movement of charge creates currents that power everything from light bulbs to complex machinery. Measured in coulombs, charge is the cornerstone of electrical systems, allowing us to understand how energy is transferred and stored. From the smallest measurements of pico-coulombs to the larger units like stat-coulombs, charge is key to understanding how electricity operates at every scale.
- Coulomb (C): The SI unit of electric charge, representing the amount of charge transferred by a current of one ampere in one second.
- Milli-coulomb (mC): One thousandth of a coulomb (1 mC = 10⁻³ C), used for smaller charge measurements.
- Micro-coulomb (µC): One millionth of a coulomb (1 µC = 10⁻⁶ C), commonly used in electrostatics.
- Pico-coulomb (pC): One trillionth of a coulomb (1 pC = 10⁻¹² C), used for extremely small charge amounts.
- Stat-coulomb (esu): A unit of charge used in electrostatics, equal to approximately 3.3356 × 10⁻¹⁰ C.