Chapter-1|Electric Charges and Fields | NCERT 12th Physics:
Basic properties of electric charge:- From the experimental observation the electric charge has following three basic properties.
1.Additive nature of electric charge:- Electric charge is additive in nature, that means the total charge of the system is the algebraic sum of all the individual charges located at different position inside the system.
If a system contain charges q₁, q₂, q₃, ……….qₙ, then total charge
q = q₁+q₂+q₃+ ………..+ qₙ
2.Conservation of Electric Charge:- During any process, the net electric charge of an isolated system remains constant that means conserved. In simple words, charge can neither be created nor be destroyed.
3.Quantisation of electric charge:- The charge on any body can be expressed as an integral multiple of basic unit of charge i.e charge on one electron. This phenomenon is called quantisation of electric charge.
It can be written as.
q = ⁺₋ ne
Where n = 1,2,3,……… is any integers, positive or negative and e is the basic unit of charge.
Charge is said to be quantised because it can have only discrete value rather than any arbitrary value.
Example:- +10e, or -6e but never represent as 3.57e.