Magnitude of dipole moment

[nothingatall]

Homework Statement

A certain electric dipole is placed in a uniform electric field E of magnitude 20 N/C. Figure 22-59 gives the potential energy U of the dipole versus the angle θ between E and the dipole moment P. What is the magnitude of P?

Homework Equations

U=p(dot)E

The Attempt at a Solution

Somehow there is an integral needed to solve this but I don't know where to start. there is also a graph with this question.

 

[minimark1234]

i thought...
[tex]U=-\vec{p} \cdot \vec{E}[/tex]
but idk if that really changes much.

 

[nothingatall]

It does, i was just forgetting to multiply it by the factor of 10^-26 hehe. Thanks.

 

[slamin27]

can't you just take Us to be the maximum, and the angle of 180 to be the angle that corresponds to the maximum potential, and plug these into U=-pEcos(theta), along with the magnitude of E?

 

[rwisz]

The magnitude of a dipole moment is a measure of the strength of an electric dipole. It is calculated by taking the product of the magnitude of the charges and the distance between them. In this case, the magnitude of the dipole moment can be found by using the equation U=p(dot)E, where U is the potential energy, p is the dipole moment, and E is the magnitude of the electric field. From the given information, we know that the magnitude of the electric field is 20 N/C. We can also see from the graph that the potential energy is at a minimum when the angle θ is 90 degrees, which means that the dipole moment is aligned with the electric field. Therefore, the magnitude of the dipole moment can be calculated as p=U/E=0/20=0. So, the magnitude of the dipole moment in this scenario is 0.