Answer to Question #185429 in Electric Circuits for rose

Question

say something about the Van de Graaff generator; why do hair fly up when you touch the device?

Answer 1

Explanations

• Van De Graaff generator is equipment made for the purpose of generating & temporarily storing greater amounts of electrostatic charges.
• It is achieved by picking up charges by means of two sharp comb-like brushes in contact with a motor-driven silk belt.
• One brush is connected to a battery at the bottom & the other is connected to the metal dome on top of the apparatus.
• The battery provides positive charges to the belt via the brush connected to it while those are collected by the other brush & stores them on the dome connected to it.
• Eventually, the dome gets positively charged.

• When someone touches the dome (he should be isolated from the ground to see the effect) he acts like another storage device connected to the dome.
• Eventually, the person gets charged & charges spread all over the body.
• Hair is a slender object therefore, it gets charged very easily compared to the other body parts.
• Having each (or most of them) strand of hair charged with like charges they tend to repel each other which results in a flown hair.