Electric Field Lines
Place charges, see field lines. Builds on Coulomb's Law.
You place two equal POSITIVE charges a short distance apart. You then visualize the electric field lines everywhere in the surrounding space.
What do the electric field lines look like in the region between the two charges?
The field lines curve away from the space between the charges! Since both charges are positive, their fields push outward in all directions. In the region between them, the two fields point in opposite directions and partially cancel. The lines curve aside, leaving a ‘dead zone’ at the exact midpoint where the electric field is zero.
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Place two positive charges and watch the field lines appear. Notice how they bow outward between like charges. Now change one to negative — the lines connect! Try dragging charges closer and watch the pattern reshape in real time.
E = F / q = kQ / r²
The electric field exists everywhere in space around a charge — whether or not another charge is there to feel it. It’s the force per unit charge, waiting to act.
Sharp tips concentrate field lines, creating intense fields that ionize air and safely guide lightning strikes to ground — Benjamin Franklin’s brilliant invention.
Electric fields steer beams of electrons to paint images on the screen. Each pixel is an electron guided by carefully shaped E-fields.
Biologists use uniform electric fields to separate DNA fragments by size. Charged molecules drift through gel — smaller ones move faster.
Even on clear days, Earth’s surface has a downward electric field of ~100 V/m. The atmosphere is a giant spherical capacitor, continuously recharged by thunderstorms worldwide.
“Faraday couldn’t do the math, so he drew pictures of field lines instead. Those pictures turned out to be one of the most powerful ideas in all of physics.”
Field Explorer
Place charges anywhere and watch the electric field come alive. See field lines, field vectors, and a color-mapped potential surface all update in real time. Build dipoles, quadrupoles, or any configuration you can dream up.
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Create a dipole (one + and one −). Watch the beautiful field lines arc from positive to negative. Now add a second dipole nearby — see how the patterns interact. Try placing four charges in a square: two + on opposite corners and two − on the others (a quadrupole). Toggle the field vector overlay to see the direction and strength at every point. Can you find the null points where E = 0?
Electric field lines are not just a drawing tool — they represent something real. The density of lines shows field strength, and their direction shows which way a positive charge would accelerate. Faraday’s visual insight eventually became Maxwell’s equations.