Calculating E Field Inside Cylinder of Finite Height

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SUMMARY

The discussion focuses on calculating the electric field (E field) inside a finite-height cylinder with uniform charge density. It highlights that while an infinitely long cylinder results in a zero electric field due to symmetry, a finite cylinder allows for the electric field to depend on the height. The key takeaway is that the electric field inside a finite cylinder is influenced by both the radius and height, contrary to the assumption made for infinite cylinders.

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  • Understanding of Gauss's Law
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  • Knowledge of cylindrical symmetry in electrostatics
  • Basic concepts of vector fields
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Fibo112
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I have a cylinder with radius r and height h and a uniform charge density. Now I am supposed to calculate the E field inside the cylinder. If the cylinder was infinitely long the symmetry would dictate that the field can only point radially outward, so gausses law would give me a field of zero everywhere. In the solutions it uses the argument that the field only depends on the radius due to symmetry. But in this case the cylinder is not infinite, so why can't the field depend on the height?
 
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Fibo112 said:
I have a cylinder with radius r and height h and a uniform charge density. Now I am supposed to calculate the E field inside the cylinder. If the cylinder was infinitely long the symmetry would dictate that the field can only point radially outward, so gausses law would give me a field of zero everywhere. In the solutions it uses the argument that the field only depends on the radius due to symmetry. But in this case the cylinder is not infinite, so why can't the field depend on the height?
It can depend on height. In this case it can not depend on the angular coordinate.
 
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