Statvolt

Statvolt

Statvolt

A CGS-ESU and gaussian unit of voltage

The statvolt is a unit of voltage and electrical potential used in the CGS-ESU and gaussian systems of units. In terms of its relation to the SI units, one statvolt corresponds to ccgs 10−8 volt,[lower-alpha 1] i.e. to 299.792458 volts.[2][lower-alpha 2]

Quick Facts Unit system, Unit of ...

The statvolt is also defined in the CGS system as 1 erg / statcoulomb.[2] It is a useful unit for electromagnetism because, in a vacuum, an electric field of one statvolt per centimetre has the same energy density as a magnetic field of one gauss. Likewise, a plane wave propagating in a vacuum has perpendicular electric and magnetic fields such that for every gauss of magnetic field intensity there is one statvolt/cm of electric field intensity.[2]

In the CGS-EMU system, the unit of voltage is the abvolt.

Notes

  1. The dimensionless constant ccgs = 2.99792458×1010 is numerically equal to the magnitude of the speed of light when the latter is expressed in cm/s.
  2. As of the 2019 redefinition of the SI base units, this correspondence is not longer exact.

References

  1. [1]
    Gyllenbok, Jan (2018). Encyclopaedia of Historical Metrology, Weights, and Measures: Volume 1. Birkhäuser. ISBN 978-3-319-57598-8.
  2. [2]
    Purcell, Edward (2011). Electricity and Magnetism (Second ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 474–475. ISBN 9781107013605.
Share this article:

This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Statvolt, and is written by contributors. Text is available under a CC BY-SA 4.0 International License; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.