sähkömäärästä

Sähkömäärä, often translated as electric charge, is a fundamental property of matter that causes it to experience a force when placed in an electromagnetic field. It is a scalar quantity, meaning it only has magnitude, and is measured in coulombs (C). Electric charge can be positive or negative. Protons, found in the nucleus of atoms, carry a positive charge, while electrons, orbiting the nucleus, carry a negative charge. Neutral atoms have an equal number of protons and electrons, resulting in a net charge of zero. The elementary charge, denoted by 'e', is the magnitude of the charge of a single electron or proton, approximately 1.602 x 10^-19 coulombs.

The conservation of electric charge is a fundamental principle in physics, stating that the total electric charge in an isolated system remains constant. Charge cannot be created or destroyed, only transferred from one object to another or rearranged within an object. This principle underlies many electrical phenomena. Electric charge is the source of electrostatic forces, described by Coulomb's Law, which states that the force between two point charges is directly proportional to the product of their magnitudes and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. Like charges repel each other, while opposite charges attract. Understanding electric charge is crucial for comprehending electricity, magnetism, and electromagnetism.