Abstract

A simple numerical method of multidimensional minimisation is applied in order to find the equilibrium configuration of N point charges confined to a given volume or surface. The method is applied to different geometric forms with both Coulomb and nonharmonic interacting potentials. The technique presented in this paper is very useful from a didactic point of view, as it allows the approximate configuration of charges on conductors to be visualised and stresses the importance of the inverse square law for the charge distribution. For this purpose, different three-dimensional and two-dimensional examples are presented.

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