Electric Charge

Electric charge is a physical property which can be either positive or negative. Objects with like charges repel each other. Objects with unlike charges attract each other.Electric Charge is measured in coulombs (C). A particle that has electric charge is a charge carrier. In an electrolyte, the charge carriers are ions. In a metal wire the charge carriers are electrons.The size of the charge on an electron is called the elementary charge e and is 1.6 x 10^-19C (an electron has charge -e). The charge on a proton is +1.6 x 10^-19C. All charged objects are positive if electrons have been removed and negative if electrons have been added. The charge on an object is quantised and is always a multiple of e.Q = ± newhere Q is the charge, n is the number of electrons added or removed and e is the elementary charge.