EE 3513: Electromagnetic Fields and Waves

Lecture 13:
Electrostatics
Electric Potential

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In the last lecture

 Applications of Gauss’s Law

– Gaussian surface
– Point charge
– Infinite line charge
– Infinite charge sheet
– Uniformly Charged sphere

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 Gaussian Surface: Summary
 Identified for symmetric charge distribution having
– rectangular symmetry if it depends only on x, or y or z,
– cylindrical symmetry if it depends only on ρ,
– and spherical symmetry if it depends only on r (not θ or ϕ).
 Gauss’s Law is also valid for asymmetric charge distribution.
– However, you can’t apply Gauss’s Law in closed form to
determine E or D.
– In such situations, either numerical solution of the integral is
used or apply Coulomb’s Law.
 Gaussian surface is chosen such that D is normal or tangential
to the surface.
 
– When D is normal to the surface
 then D  dS  D ,
– For tangential D  dS  0.
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Examples

 Example 4.8

 Example 4.9

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 Electrostatic Potential
 An electric field is a force field
– If a body being acted on by a
force is moved from one
point to another, then work is
done.
– The concept of scalar
electric potential provides a
measure of the work done in
moving charged bodies in an
electrostatic field.

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Electrostatic Potential (continued)

B
A

 The work done in moving a test charge from

one point to another in a region of electric field:
– Can be calculated by evaluating the line integral:

 B B  
WAB   q  F  dl   q  E  dl
A A

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 Electrostatic Potential Difference

 The work done per unit charge in moving a test charge Q

from point A to point B is the electrostatic potential
difference between the two points:

WAB
B 
VAB     E  dl
Q A

Electrostatic potential difference Units are

Joules/Coulumb or more commonly volts.

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Electrostatic field is conservative

B
 Consider the figure:
 For two paths
VBA = -VAB A
 The value of electric potential difference depends
only on the end points and is independent of the
path taken.
 
 Therefore VBA + VAB = 0 or E  dl  0 
 The line integral around any closed path is zero.
The electrostatic field is conservative
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 Maxwell’s Second Equation
 The electrostatic field is conservative so
 
 E  dl  0
 However according to Stoke’s theorem
   
 E  dl     E  dS  0
or 
 E  0
This is the Maxwell’s second equation for static fields

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Electrostatic Potential

 Since the electrostatic field is conservative, we can write

 
B P0
  B  
VAB    E  dl    E  d l   E  d l
A A P0

   A  
B
   E  dl     E  dl   VB  VA
 P 
P0  0 
VA is the potential at point A
VB is the potential at point B.

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 Electrostatic Potential (continued)

 Thus the electrostatic potential V is a scalar field that is

defined at every point in space.
 In particular the value of the electrostatic potential at any
point P is given by
  P
VP    E  dl
P0

 The reference point (P0) is where the potential is zero

(analogous to ground in circuit theory).

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Potential due to point charge

 Electric field due to a

charge Q at origin is:

 The potential difference

between two points A
and B is given as:

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 Electrostatic Potential of Point Charge at the Origin

 The potential at any point is the potential difference at

that point and a chosen point at which the potential is zero
 Assuming potential at infinity is zero we can write

r   r
Q
V (r )    E  dl    aˆ r  aˆ r dr 
40 r 
2
 

 Q dr  Q
 V (r ) 
40  r 
r
2

40 r

 Q
V (r )  spherically symmetric
40 r
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Electrostatic Potential and Electric Field

 The work done in moving from point A to point B can be

written as B  
WAB  QVAB  QVB  VA   Q  E  dl
A
 Along a short path of length Δl we have
 
 
W  QV  Q E  l   V   E  l
 Along an incremental path of length dl we have
 
dV   E  dl
 Recall from the definition of directional
 derivative:
dV  V  dl 
E  V
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 Scalar Electric Potential
  
E ( r )  V ( r )
 As a static electric field is a conservative vector field.
Therefore, we can write any static electric field as the
gradient of a specific scalar field V

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Electristatic Potential due to point charge

Contour Plot

3-D Plot

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 Electric field vs Electric potential for point charge

We plot Electric field

and electric potential
together

It is clear that the plot

is consistent with the
equation:
  
E ( r )  V ( r )

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Electrostatic Potential Resulting from Multiple

Point Charges

 Electric potential due to point charge at origin:

 Q
V (r ) 
40 r
 If the point charge is at any arbitrary point r/
 Q
V (r ) 
40 r  r 
 For multiple charges
 Q1 Q2 Q3
V (r )     ......
40 r  r1 40 r  r2 40 r  r3
 1 N
Qk
V (r ) 
40
 r  r
k 1 k
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 Potential due to point charges

 One important point should be noted:

– The formula for point charge is derived taking infinity
as reference (a point of zero potential)
– However if there is some other point taken as
reference the formula for point charge is generalized
as:
 Q
V (r )  C
4 0 r
– The constant C is evaluated by putting the reference
point
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Electrostatic Potential Resulting from Continuous

Charge Distributions

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 Example 1: Potential due to point charges

Determine the electric potential at the origin due to four 20-

mC charges residing in free space at the corners of a 2×2
square centered about the origin in the x–y plane.

Solution:
For four identical charges all equidistant
from the origin:

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Example 2: Potential due surface charge

A spherical shell of radius R has a uniform surface charge

density ρS. Determine the electric potential at the center of
the shell.
Solution:
– For a surface charge the potential is given as:

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 Examples

 Example 4.10

 Example 4.11

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