what is static electricity?

Answer 1

Static electricity is a stationary electric charge that is built up on a material. A common example of static electricity is the slight electrical shock that we can get when we touch a doorknob during dry weather. The static electricity is formed when we accumulate extra electrons (negatively-charged particles which we rub off carpeting) and they are discharged onto the doorknob.
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/physics/Staticelectricity.shtml

Read
Static Electricity
What causes static shocks?
by Science Made Simple

http://www.sciencemadesimple.com/static.html

Usually, atoms have the same number of electrons and protons. Then the atom has no charge, it is "neutral." But if you rub things together, electrons can move from one atom to another. Some atoms get extra electrons. They have a negative charge. Other atoms lose electrons. They have a positive charge. When charges are separated like this, it is called static electricity.



Static electricity is the imbalance of
positive and negative charges.

Answer 2

static electricity is also known by another term known as electrostatics. It is the ability of an object to hold charge and produces the force of attraction and repulsion by generating certain (quite low) amount of voltage. For eg: When u switch your TV on and after sometime when u switch it off, and then try to waive your hand close to the TV screen you will feel some charges are there. This is due to static electricity or we also called it as electrotatics.

Answer 3

Before 1839, physicists regarded "static electricity" as a substance distinct from four other kinds of electricity: "current" or "Voltaic" electricity, "Animal" or "bioelectricity," "thermoelectricity" from thermocouples and "magnetoelectricity" from coils. In that year Michael Faraday published the results of his experiments on the Identity of Electricities. He demonstrated that the divisions between static, current, etc., were illusions, that all five "kinds of electricity" were actually collections of phenomena, while electricity itself was a single entity appearing in negative and positive forms.

Today we regard static electricity as a subject heading also called Electrostatics: a class of various phenomena associated with substances or objects having a net electric charge. In everyday usage, "static electricity" typically refers to charged objects with voltages of sufficient magnitude to produce visible attraction, repulsion, and electrical sparks.

Static electricity can be a serious nuisance in the processing of analog recording media, because it can attract dust to sensitive materials. In the case of photography, dust accumulating on lenses and photographic plates degrades the resulting picture.

Answer 4

It is a stationary [at rest] electrical charge.

Answer 5

very high voltage and very low amperage electricity.