electric displacement

electric displacement, auxiliary electric field or electric vector that represents that aspect of an electric field associated solely with the presence of separated free electric charges, purposely excluding the contribution of any electric charges bound together in neutral atoms or molecules. If electric charge is transferred between two originally uncharged parallel metal plates, one becomes positively charged and the other negatively charged by the same amount, and an electric field exists between the plates. If a slab of insulating material is inserted between the charged plates, the bound electric charges comprising the internal structure of the insulation are displaced slightly, or polarized; bound negative charges (atomic electrons) shift a fraction of an atomic diameter toward the positive plate, and bound positive charges shift very slightly toward the negative. This shift of charge, or polarization, reduces the value of the electric field that was present before the insertion of the insulation. The actual average value of the electric field E, therefore, has a component P that depends on the bound polarization charges and a component D, electric displacement, that depends on the free separated charges on the plates. The relationship among the three vectors D, E, P in the metre-kilogram-second (mks) or SI system is: D = ε₀E + P (ε₀ is a constant, the permittivity of a vacuum). In the centimetre-gram-second (cgs) system the relationship is: D = E + 4πP.

The value of the electric displacement D may be thought of as equal to the amount of free charge on one plate divided by the area of the plate. From this point of view D is frequently called the electric flux density, or free charge surface density, because of the close relationship between electric flux and electric charge. The dimensions of electric displacement, or electric flux density, in the metre-kilogram-second system are charge per unit area, and the units are coulombs per square metre. In the centimetre-gram-second system the dimensions of D are the same as those of the primary electric field E, the units of which are dynes per electrostatic unit, or statvolts per centimetre.