Definition
Electric current density J is simply the electric current I (SI unit: A) per unit area A (SI unit: m2). Its magnitude is given by the limit:
For current density as a vector J, the surface integral over a surface S, followed by an integral over the time duration t1 to t2, gives the total amount of charge flowing through the surface in that time (t2 − t1):
The area required to calculate the flux is real or imaginary, flat or curved, either as a cross-sectional area or a surface. For example, for charge carriers passing through an electrical conductor, the area is the cross-section of the conductor, at the section considered.
The vector area is a combination of the magnitude of the area through which the mass passes through, A, and a unit vector normal to the area, . The relation is .
If the current density J passes through the area at an angle θ to the area normal, then
where · is the dot product of the unit vectors. This is, the component of current density passing through the surface (i.e. normal to it) is J cos θ, while the component of current density passing tangential to the area is J sin θ, but there is no current density actually passing through the area in the tangential direction. The only component of current density passing normal to the area is the cosine component.
Read more about this topic: Current Density
Famous quotes containing the word definition:
“... we all know the wag’s definition of a philanthropist: a man whose charity increases directly as the square of the distance.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“It is very hard to give a just definition of love. The most we can say of it is this: that in the soul, it is a desire to rule; in the spirit, it is a sympathy; and in the body, it is but a hidden and subtle desire to possess—after many mysteries—what one loves.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)
“Beauty, like all other qualities presented to human experience, is relative; and the definition of it becomes unmeaning and useless in proportion to its abstractness. To define beauty not in the most abstract, but in the most concrete terms possible, not to find a universal formula for it, but the formula which expresses most adequately this or that special manifestation of it, is the aim of the true student of aesthetics.”
—Walter Pater (1839–1894)