Capacitors Are Gaps! How Does That Work?!

Capacitors are tiny physical gaps in a circuit. How does that even work? Well, if we analyze capacitors on a deep level, we see they're almost breathing energy.

00:00 Cold Open
00:23 The Basics
02:30 Steady State vs Transient State
03:54 Capacitor Voltage
06:59 Displacement Current
09:17 Circuit Energy Flow
11:29 Capacitor Energy Flow
12:29 Summary
13:03 Outro
13:21 Sponsor Segment
14:32 Featured Comment
________________________________
VIDEO ANNOTATIONS/CARDS

Previous Circuit Energy Video:

Why is Charge Conserved?

Why Does Stuff Happen? Gradients!
________________________________
RELATED YOUTUBE VIDEOS

ElectroBOOM on Circuit Energy:

Alpha Phoenix on Circuit Energy:
________________________________
SUPPORT THE SCIENCE ASYLUM

Patreon:

YouTube Membership:

Advanced Theoretical Physics (Paperback):

Advanced Theoretical Physics (eBook):

Merchandise:
________________________________
HUGE THANK YOU TO THESE SUPPORTERS

Asylum Counselors:
Matthew O'Connor, Nikolaos Vasiloglou II

Asylum Orderlies:
Dhruv Singhal, Fabio Manzini, Medec Hurtz

Einsteinium Crazies:
Bosphorus, Eoin O'Sullivan, Ilya Yashin, Jonathan Lima, Joseph Salomone, OnlineBookClub, Sean K, Wacky, Blank NA, Flying Monkey, Christopher Schiele

Plutonium Crazies:
Al Davis, Compuart, Ellis Hall, Kevin MacLean, Madhu Subbu, Rick Myers, Vid Icarus

Platinum Crazies:
André Weyermann, Benjamin Dixon, Benjamin Reynolds, Clayton Bruckert, David Johnston, James Coley, Jon Adams, Jonas Wepeel, Jonathan Reel, Kyle Bowles, Marino Hernandez, Mikayla Eckel Cifrese, Mr. Orn Jonasar, Olga Cooperman, Patrick Mathieson, Stephen Blinn, Stephen Gailey, Tom Hawking, Don Wilshe
________________________________
OTHER SOURCES

________________________________
LINKS TO COMMENTS

________________________________
IMAGE CREDITS

Capacitor Variety Pack:

ElectroBOOM Clip:

John Green Screenshot:

[ScienceAsylum]

Start building your ideal daily routine 💪 The first 100 people who click on the link will get 25% OFF 🎁 Fabulous Premium ➡ thefab.co/thescienceasylum

[BigTunaTim]

I've never heard capacitors described as "breathing energy" before but I think it's a brilliant analogy that would have saved me a lot of confusion when I was trying to understand them.

[PeterMatisko]

Nick, probably the best capacitor explanation I have seen so far. Thank you for that! As an electrical engineer, I was always taught "This is a capacitor, this equation describes how it behaves. That's it." But we were never explained "why" and "how" on a deeper level.

[jorzer]

I have 25yrs in the HVAC trade. I've spent so much time understanding completely how capacitors really work. They have many uses in motors and circuits. This was a great video, helped visualize the concepts

[paulduncan]

"I theoretical physicisttt" almost cost a very painful 'soda-out-nose' incident I laughed so hard. Please keep doing these outstanding videos!

[jeffpkamp]

Thank you for drawing out the Poynting vectors on this one. I know it's ridiculous to get into all the minutia about the physics, but that made your previous video about energy flow make a little bit more sense.

[NathanRichHotpot]

I have to say I've learned more about electric fields from your channel than anywhere else. Very interesting perspective and way of conveying information. And thank you for toning down the wild screaming and side stuff. I like the tone of this video a lot. Good work!

[Aengus]

I use variable air gapped capacitors for shortwave listening. They are absolute works of art! Beautiful things! I love watching the plates slide between each other as you tune them to resonance.

[itzchi]

Great explanation!
I was going to ask Veritasium to make a follow up video about the circuit energy flow video...but no need now. Your ability to explain complex concepts in a simple way with a pinch of humor is truly amazing. Really appreciate it. Plus you manage to do it without any click bait ;)

[prestonburton]

This is revolutionary - please keep going. I'm old school - classically trained but understand where you are going here. The jump start you can give our new experimenters will be profound.

[mikeportjogger]

When I was a teenager I had an air-gap variable capacitor to tune a crystal set radio receiver. It also had a hand-wound coil on a cardboard tube as the inductor. The antenna was a wire strung from my bedroom window to a post down the garden. That led to a lifetime career in electronics.

[andycopeland]

Hey you're doing great man thank you for consistently blowing my mind.

We had our first child this year and want to homeschool our kids. This year your channel changed the way I view education and learning. Going to be a long time before even our first kiddo touches anything you've taught me but I won't forget. She'll be watching your videos and learning alongside me sometime soon so please don't stop.

God bless you and your wife. Happy new year. Keep doing it man!

[leonardomarsaglia]

If only teachers at school/college would be as Lucid as Nick... things would be very different I'm sure! Great video as always. Thanks for the content!

[BenjaminGatti]

Flirting with the Veratasium debacle without touching it? Love your channel! Also, any thoughts on Veratasium's assertion?

[juzoli]

That animation at 11:20 is very good representation to clear up the misconception, that the energy does NOT leave the neighborhood of the wire. It is outside and around the wire, but still goes along the wire, following its direction.
It’s like if you replace the real wire with a much thicker imaginary wire with no definitive edge, which goes in the same direction.

[JanVerny]

Anyone else still having PTSD from the Veritasium video?

[stevenbliss]

I am a lifelong retired electronics & software engineer, and all this physics BLOWS MY MIND!
Pointing vectors AGAIN! My head CANNOT TAKE
I use maths a lots sometimes for circuits, but you physics guys are on a different level!

[Chrismas]

I'm in avionics, and it's been a while since I've had a refresher on electrical components, this is way better than the way I was taught

[Lucky]

10:38 Oh right! So _that's_ why doping a semiconductor makes it a better conductor -- it doesn't give any more energy to the charge carriers, just means _more_ charge carriers are free to move around. I'm currently taking an EE class on semiconductor physics and we're finally getting to the parts that relate to electrodynamics (as opposed to the lower level stuff that's all quantum mechanics and statistical chemistry) so that's what came to mind rewatching this video. It's amazing how _connected_ everything is in physics.

[dirtymike]

7:50 - I was an electronic technician in the Navy, I was then an electrician for 10 years, I then went on to get bachelor's and master's degrees in electrical engineering. Long story short, I have a lot of experience with electrical teaching techniques.
Anyway, I have never heard this diaphragm analogy for a capacitor. I like it.