# Electric constant

The electric constant, or vacuum permittivity, earlier called the absolute dielectric permittivity and dielectric permittivity of vacuum, is a physical constant, a scalar quantity that:

• determines the strength and potential of the electromagnetic field in the classical vacuum;
• is part of the expressions for some laws of electromagnetism, when they are written in the form corresponding to the International System of Units (SI).

The electric constant has the dimension of farad per meter.

Contents

• 1 Definition
• 2 Application
• 3 Expression in terms of the vacuum field parameters
• 4 References

Definition

The electric constant    is determined with the help of the speed of light    and the magnetic constant   : [1]

F/m.

Application

The electric constant appears in Maxwell's equations in vacuum, which describe the properties of electric and magnetic fields, as well as electromagnetic radiation, and relate the fields with their sources.

In the matter the material equations of the electromagnetic field are used, while the electric displacement field  D  is expressed in terms of the electric constant, the electric field  strength vector  E  and the polarization density vector  P:

As a rule, we can assume that  ,  where the quantity    represents a tensor and is called electric polarizability. This expression means that the polarization density vector as a certain reaction of the matter is generated by the vector of the electric field strength in the matter, while the directions of these vectors may not coincide.

In the weak field, the quantity    has the special name electric susceptibility and it is almost constant, depending on the type of matter and its state. In this case we can write:

The product of the electric constant by the relative permittivity    in this expression is called the absolute electric permittivity  .

The electric constant is included in the formulation of the Coulomb's Law, giving the expression for the force acting between two electric charges:

where    is the distance between the charges    and  . If    is a vector directed from the charge    to the charge   , then the force    will be the force acting on the charge    from the charge . From the expression for the force we can see that the electric constant in the system of physical units SI relates the electric charge with the mechanical units, such as force and distance.

Expression in terms of the vacuum field parameters

In the concept of the force vacuum field [2] it is assumed that the vacuum is filled with the fluxes of particles that create gravitational and electromagnetic forces between the bodies. In particular, the fluxes of charged particles – praons, moving at relativistic velocities and transferring their momentum to the charged matter, are considered to be responsible for emergence of the Coulomb force.

In the model of cubic distribution of the praons’ fluxes, for the electric constant we obtain the following: [3]

Here    is the momentum of praons, interacting with the charged matter; the fluence rate    denotes the number of praons  dN  coming per time  dt  through the perpendicular to the flux area  dA  of one face of the cube, limiting the volume under consideration;   m² is the cross-section of interaction between praons and nucleons;  is the elementary charge;   J/m³ is the energy density of the praons’ fluxes for cubic distribution.

In the model of spherical distribution of the praons’ fluxes in space:

where the fluence rate    denotes the number of praons  dN  coming per time  dt  from the unit solid angle     inside the spherical surface dA;   J/m³ is the energy density of the praons’ fluxes for spherical distribution.

Hence it follows that the electric constant is a dynamic variable, depending on the parameters of the vacuum field particles.

References

1.      CODATA Value: electric constant. The NIST Reference on Constants, Units, and Uncertainty. US National Institute of Standards and Technology. June 2015. Retrieved 2015-09-25. 2014 CODATA recommended values.

2.      Fedosin S.G. The Force Vacuum Field as an Alternative to the Ether and Quantum Vacuum. WSEAS Transactions on Applied and Theoretical Mechanics, ISSN / E-ISSN: 1991-8747 / 2224-3429, Volume 10, Art. #3, pp. 31-38 (2015).

3.      Fedosin S.G. The charged component of the vacuum field as the source of electric force in the modernized Le Sage’s model. Journal of Fundamental and Applied Sciences, Vol. 8, No. 3, pp. 971-1020 (2016). https://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.845357.