II PU – PHYSICS -1-
NATIONAL COMP. PU COLLEGE, HOSPET.
PHYSICS PREVIOUS YEAR QUESTIONS
TOPIC: ELECTRIC CHARGES & FIELDS AND ELECTROSTATIC POTENTIAL
AND CAPACITANCE
One marks questions:
1. Write the SI unit of charge. (Mar-2014)
2. Define S.I unit of charge. (Mar-2015)
3. What is an electric dipole? (Mar-2016)
4. What is an equipotential surface? (Mar-2018)
5. State Coulomb’s Law. (Mar-2019)
6. Write the SI unit of electric flux. (Mar-2020)
7. Name the apparatus used to detect electric charge on a body. (Mar-2022)
8. Define Electric dipole moment. (Mar-2022)
Two marks questions:
1. State and explain Coulomb’s law in electrostatics. (Mar-2014, mar-17, mar-2020)
2. Write Coulomb’s law in Vector form. Explain the terms. (Mar-2015)
3. Write two properties of electric field lines. (Mar-2016, mar-17)
4. Mention any two factors on which the capacitance of a parallel plate capacitor depends.
(Mar-2018)
5. Write any two basic properties of charge. (Mar-2019)
6. A parallel plate capacitor with air between the plates has a capacitance C. (Mar-2020)
What will be the capacitance if
(a) the distance between the plates is doubled?
(b) the space between the plates is filled with a substance of dielectric constant 5?
7. What are polar and non-polar molecules? (Mar-2022)
Three marks questions:
1. Derive the expression for potential energy of a system of two charges in the absence of the
external electric field. (Mar-2014)
2. Derive the expression for capacitance of parallel plate capacitor. (Mar-2015, mar-16)
3. On what factors does the capacitance of a parallel plate capacitors depend? (Mar-2017)
4. Derive the relation between electric field and electric potential due to a point charge.
(Mar-2017, Mar-2020)
5. Derive the expression for energy stored in a charged capacitor. (Mar-2017, mar-2020)
6. Give three properties of electric charge. (Mar-2018)
7. Derive an expression for potential energy of electric-dipole placed in an uniform
electric field. (Mar-2019)
8. Mention the three factors on which the capacitance of a dielectric parallel plate
capacitor depends. (Mar-2022)
II PU – PHYSICS -2-
Five marks questions:
1. State Gauss law in electrostatics. Using the law derive an expression for electric field due to a
uniformly charged thin spherical shell at a point outside the shell. (Mar-2014)
2. Derive an expression for electric field due to an electric dipole at a point on an equatorial line.
(Mar-2015)
3. Derive an expression for Electric field due to an Electric dipole at a point on the axial line.
(Mar-2016)
4. Define electric potential due to a point charge and arrive at the expression for the
electric potential at a point due to a point charge. (Mar-2018)
5. What is an electric field line? Write the four general properties of electric field lines.
(Mar-2022)
Five marks (Numerical) questions:
1. In a parallel plate capacitor with air between the plates, each plate has an area of 6 x 10 -3 m2
and the distance between the plates is 3 mm. Calculate the capacitance of the capacitor. If this
capacitor is connected to a 100 V supply, what is the charge on each plate of the capacitor?
(Absolute permittivity of free space = 8.85 x 10-12 Fm-1) (Mar-2014)
2. Two point charges +1 nC and – 4 nC are 1m apart in air. Find the positions along the line
joining the two charges at which resultant potential is zero. (Mar-2015)
3. When two capacitors are connected in series and connected across 4 kV line, the energy stored
in the system is 8 J. The same capacitors, if connected in parallel across the same line, the
energy stored is 36 J. Find the individual capacitances. (Mar-2016)
4. Two point charges q A = 3 c and qB = - 3 c are located 20 cm apart in vacuum.
(a) What is the electric field at the mid point O of the line AB joining the two charges?
(b) If a negative test charge of magnitude 1.5 x 10-9 C is placed at this point. What is
the force experienced by the test charge? (Mar-2017)
5. Three charges each equal to + 4 nC are placed at the three corners of a square of side 2 cm.
Find the electric field at the fourth corner. (Mar-2018)
6. In a circular parallel plate capacitor radius of each plate is 5 cm and they are separated
by a distance of 2 mm. Calculate the capacitance and the energy stored, when it is charged
by connecting the battery of 200 V (given 0 = 8.854 x 10-12 Fm-1). (Mar-2019)
7. Two point charges q A = 5 c and qB = - 5 c are located at A and B separated by 0.2 m
in vacuum.
(a) What is the electric field at the mid point O of the line joining the charges?
(b) If a negative test charge of magnitude 2 nC is placed at O,What is the force
experienced by the test charge? (Mar-2020)
-7 -7
8. Two small charged spheres having charges of 2 x 10 C and 3 x 10 C are placed 3 cm apart
in vacuum. Find the electrostatic force between them. Find the new force, when the distance
between them is doubled. (Mar-2022)
9. A charge of 8 mC is located at the origin. Calculate the work done in taking a small charge
of – 2 x 10-8 C from a point A (3cm, 0, 0) to a point B (0, 4cm, 0) via a point
C (3cm, 4cm, 0). (Mar-2022)
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