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ION THEORY
What are ions you may ask, are they protons or electrons? Actually they are
neither one, at least not electrons by themselves. An ion is a charged mole-
cule like that of a particle of smoke which either has one or more electrons re-
moved, or one or more extra electrons added giving it the ability to carry a
charge of electricity.
Imagine rubbing a balloon on your head; we’re
making the assumption there’s a little hair up
there! The resulting static that accumulates on
the balloon will have a negative charge as seen
by looking at the Triboelectric series chart. This
chart shows us how materials gain or loose elec-
trons when brought in contact and then removed
from one another. We can see that human hair
is more positive than the rubber balloon, so the
hair winds up loosing electrons while the rubber
balloon gains them. The balloon now becomes a
very large negative “ion” in the sense that it car-
ries a net electrically negative charge.
Now try and stick the balloon to the ceiling.
When you bring the balloon closer and closer to
the surface of the ceiling, its negative charge
begins repelling electrons from the surface of
the ceiling. The lack of electrons near the sur-
face will give that area of the ceiling a net posi-
tive charge. Now when the balloon touches the
ceiling, the attractive force between the balloon
and the ceiling is enough to suspend the bal-
loon! This inductive process allows you to use
one charged object to induce a charge in an-
other!
One thing you might expect with the prior experi-
ment is that since the balloon and the ceiling are
touching, the electrons would rapidly transfer
and neutralize the charge. This isn’t the case
however. The electrons are prevented from do-
ing so by the thin layer of air between the bal-
loon and the ceiling. This experiment won’t work
as well in humid conditions because the air be-
comes more conductive with the additional water
vapor. Increased humidity allows the electrons
to migrate through the air and neutralize the
charge even faster. This type of electron move-
Asbestos More Positive
Rabbit Fur
Acetate
Glass
Mica
Human Hair
Nylon
Wool
Fur
Lead
Silk
Aluminum
Paper
Cotton
Steel
Wood Neutral
Amber
Sealing Wax
Hard Rubber
MYLAR
Nickel
Copper
Silver
UV Resist
Brass, SS
Gold, Platinum
Sulfur
Acetate Rayon
Celluloid
Orlon
Acrylic
SRAN
Polyurethane
Polyethylene
Polypropylene
Rubber Balloon
PVC (Vinyl)
Silicon
Teflon
Silicone Rubber More Negative
Triboelectric Series
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