The Coulomb force describes the interaction between electric charges. According to Coulomb's law, like charges repel each other, while opposite charges attract each other.
Specifically:
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Like Charges: When two charges are of the same type (both positive or both negative), they repel each other. This means that if you were to bring two positive charges close together, they would exert a force on each other that pushes them apart.
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Opposite Charges: When two charges are of opposite types (one positive and one negative), they attract each other. In this case, bringing a positive charge near a negative charge would result in a force that pulls them toward each other.
The magnitude of the Coulomb force between two point charges is given by the formula:
\[ F = k \frac{|q_1 q_2|}{r^2} \]
where \( F \) is the magnitude of the force between the charges, \( k \) is Coulomb's constant, \( q_1 \) and \( q_2 \) are the magnitudes of the charges, and \( r \) is the distance between the centers of the two charges.
So to clarify, opposite charges attract, while like charges repel each other.
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