THE PHYSICAL REVIEW. THE ELECTROMOTIVE FORCE PRODUCED BY THE ACCELERATION OF METALS. BY RICHARD C. TOLMAN AND T. DALE STEWART. THE modern theories of electricity have led to the belief that the passage of an electric current through a metal really consists in the progressive motion of "free" electrons contained in the body of the metal itself. If this be true we may now expect a number of effects arising from the mass of these electrons which were not predictable on the basis of older theories which thought of electricity as a sort of intangible mass- less fluid. As examples of such effects, we should expect the rear end of an accelerated rod of metal to become negatively charged owing to the lagging behind of the relatively mobile electrons which the metal contains, and should expect the periphery of a rotating disk to become negatively charged owing to the action of centrifugal force on the electrons in the disk. Such effects, however, would presumably be very small, owing to the exceedingly small mass probably associated with the electron.
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