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Chapter 18: Q10Q (page 755)

At a typical drift speed of 5×10-5m/s, an electron traveling at that speed would take about to travel through one of your connecting wires. Why, then, does the bulb light immediately when the connecting wire is attached to the battery?

Short Answer

Expert verified

The bulb lights immediately because mobile electrons are present throughout the circuit that start moving simultaneously when switched on.

Step by step solution

01

Given data

Drift speed of electrons = 5×10-5m/s

02

Electrical force on electrons in a circuit

The force due to electric field applied on a circuit affects all mobile electrons simultaneously.

03

Determine reason why a light bulb turns on immediately when switched on

There are mobile free electrons present throughout the circuit wire. When switched on, the applied electric field from the battery acts simultaneously on all electrons throughout the circuit and they start moving instantaneously. Thus a bulb located anywhere in the circuit is lit immediately.

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Most popular questions from this chapter

There are very roughly the same number of iron atoms per m3 as there are copper atoms per m3 , but copper is a much better conductor than iron. How does uiron compare with ucopper?

Suppose that a wire leads into another, thinner wire of the same material that has only a third the cross-sectional area. In the steady state, the number of electrons per second flowing through the thick wire must be equal to the number of electrons per second flowing through the thin wire. If the drift speedV1¯in the thick wire is 4×10-5ms, what is the drift speed V¯2in the thinner wire?

A Nichrome wire 48 cm long and 0.25 mm in diameter is connected to a 1.6 V flashlight battery. What is the electric field inside the wire? Why you don’t have to know how the wire is bent? How would your answer change if the wire diameter change were 0.20 mm? (Not that the electric field in the wire is quiet small compared to the electric field near a charged tape.)

During the initial transient leading to the steady state, the electron current going into a bulb may be greater than the electron current leaving the bulb. Explain why and how these two currents come to be equal in the steady state.

What would be the potential difference VC-VBacross the thin resistor in Figure 18.103 if the battery emf is3.5V ? Assume that the electric field in the thick wires is very small (so that the potential differences along the thick wires are negligible). Do you have enough information to determine the current in the circuit?
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