Electric Potential Energy

Since Coulomb’s Law has the same form as Newton’s Law of Gravity, we will get a very similar formula for electric potential energy:

PEel = k q1 q2 / r12

Recall for gravity, PEgr = - G m1 m2 / r12 .

Note that the PEelectric does NOT have a minus sign. This is because two like charges repel instead of attract as in gravity.

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