Question

Equipment: 1 current-carrying wire set-up 1 power supply 1 ammeter Exploration 2: Direction of force on a current-carrying wire II Exploration 2.1 At your table, is the main unit you will be using today, mounted on lab stand. It is shown in the picture below. Place one of the current loops into the end of the main unit, with the foil extending down into the magnet assembly and position the lab stand with the Current Loop down between the poles of the magnet. The Current Loop should not be touching the magnet. 114

Answer 1

a. When a wire carries current, a magnetic field is produced around the wire. When a current-carrying wire is placed in an external magnetic field, the wire experiences a force due to the interaction between the 2 magnetic fields. The direction of the force is determined from the right-hand thumb rule: Stretch out your thumb, index finger & middle finger in such a way that they are mutually perpendicular; the thumb, the index finger and the middle finger represent the direction of force, current & external magnetic field respectively. In our case, the force will act upwards on the wire as shown in the following figure.

Х 1 FL B. magnet

b. No, there is no net force on the magnet. As seen in part a), the external magnetic field will produce an upward force which will push the current loop out of the magnet. Hence, the current loop does not produce any force on the magnet.