Coulomb facts for kids
The coulomb (pronounced "KOO-lom") is the official unit for measuring electric charge in the SI system. It's named after a French scientist, Charles-Augustin de Coulomb, who studied electricity in the late 1700s.
Think of electric charge as the "stuff" that makes electricity work. When this charge moves, we call it an electric current.
What is a Coulomb?
A coulomb is a specific amount of electric charge. To understand it better, imagine a flashlight bulb. If one ampere of electric current flows through that bulb, it means one coulomb of charge is passing through it every single second. So, if the flashlight stays on for ten seconds, ten coulombs of charge have moved through the bulb!
Tiny Particles of Charge
Inside an electric wire, the charge that moves is carried by tiny particles called electrons. Each electron has a very, very small amount of negative electric charge. This tiny amount is called an elementary charge. It's the smallest amount of electric charge found in a stable particle.
A single coulomb is made up of an incredibly large number of these elementary charges – about 6,241,509,629,152,650,000 (that's over six quintillion!) of them! This shows just how small the charge of one electron is.
How is a Coulomb Defined?
The coulomb is officially defined by how it relates to electric current and time.
- One coulomb (1 C) is the amount of electric charge that passes by a point when a current of one ampere (1 A) flows for one second (1 s).
This can be written as a simple formula:
See also
- Electric charge
- Ampere
- Electron
- In Spanish: Culombio para niños
