Re: electro-static charge of planets

You asked four questions. Here are some answers to those four, plus a
few extra comments:

1) Yes, at least in principle.
2) Can you clarify what you mean by the second question? There are
several ways one could interpret "electro-static inbalance of planets"
3) Yes, mostly neutral, mainly because a very small amount of charge
will produce an enormous amount of energy, so even a small amount of
charged material (in terms of moles) would make the system highly
unstable. For example, calculate the electrostatic energy of one mole
of electrons confined to one liter. It would dwarf the energy of an
atomic bomb by many many orders of magnitude.
4) Yes and no. The number of positive charges balances the number of
negative charges to a very good approximation. However, even a small
charge imbalance can produce a very large electric field, and it is
likely that a planet carries at least a small net charge.

Now for a comment: I do not know how the electric charge on a planet is
actually measured, but in principle you can measure it by measuring the
electric field surrounding the planet and then applying Gauss's law. In
principle you can measure the electric field if you are somewhat near
the planet by rotating a capacitor in the field and measuring the
current sloshing back and forth between the plates. Another way would
be to put a metal ball on a strain gauge, charge the ball, and measure
the strain. There are a number of potential problems with this method.
I will mention just one. It would be hard to distinguish the electric
field arising from the charged planet from the field arising from other
charged objects, such as the sun, or even the space probe holding the
measuring device.

Alan


mainargv@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
hi

Is there a way to measure (net) electro-static charge of planets?
Is there a way to measure electro-static inbalance of planets?
Is earth mostly (net) electro-static neutral?
I guess earth must be at least electro-static inbalanced within?

thanks

.

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