What happens to the capacitance of a parallel plate capacitor if the distance between the plates is halved?
Practice Questions
1 question
Q1
What happens to the capacitance of a parallel plate capacitor if the distance between the plates is halved?
It doubles
It halves
It quadruples
It remains the same
Capacitance, C = ε₀ * A / d. If d is halved, C doubles.
Questions & Step-by-step Solutions
1 item
Q
Q: What happens to the capacitance of a parallel plate capacitor if the distance between the plates is halved?
Solution: Capacitance, C = ε₀ * A / d. If d is halved, C doubles.
Steps: 6
Step 1: Understand the formula for capacitance, which is C = ε₀ * A / d.
Step 2: Identify the variables in the formula: C is capacitance, ε₀ is the permittivity of free space, A is the area of the plates, and d is the distance between the plates.
Step 3: Note that if the distance d is halved, it becomes d/2.
Step 4: Substitute d/2 into the capacitance formula: C = ε₀ * A / (d/2).
Step 5: Simplify the equation: C = ε₀ * A * (2/d).
Step 6: This shows that the new capacitance is double the original capacitance, so C doubles.
