What happens to the current through the galvanometer when the Wheatstone bridge is unbalanced?
Practice Questions
1 question
Q1
What happens to the current through the galvanometer when the Wheatstone bridge is unbalanced?
It becomes zero
It increases
It decreases
It becomes infinite
When the Wheatstone bridge is unbalanced, there is a non-zero potential difference across the galvanometer, causing current to flow through it.
Questions & Step-by-step Solutions
1 item
Q
Q: What happens to the current through the galvanometer when the Wheatstone bridge is unbalanced?
Solution: When the Wheatstone bridge is unbalanced, there is a non-zero potential difference across the galvanometer, causing current to flow through it.
Steps: 6
Step 1: Understand what a Wheatstone bridge is. It is a circuit used to measure unknown resistances.
Step 2: Know that the Wheatstone bridge has four resistors arranged in a diamond shape.
Step 3: Realize that the galvanometer is connected between the two midpoints of the bridge.
Step 4: When the bridge is balanced, the potential difference across the galvanometer is zero, so no current flows through it.
Step 5: When the bridge is unbalanced, the resistances are not equal, creating a difference in voltage between the two midpoints.
Step 6: This difference in voltage causes a current to flow through the galvanometer.
