Gauss's Law
Spherical-Shell Spreadsheet Exercise


In this exercise, we sketch the electric field E due to a uniformly charged spherical shell (inner radius a, outside radius b, and the total charge Q) as a function of distance r from the center. There is no charge within the radius a, and the charge Q is uniformly distributed between radii a and b.

Find the electric field E in the following three regions:

(a) r < a

(b) a < r < b

(c) r > b

and then make a graph of E(r) for the case where a = b/2. Your instructor may instruct you to do this assignment with pencil and paper, or with an Excel spreadsheet.


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