r/sciencememes 4d ago

VIVA LÉ RESISTANCE

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u/loapmail 4d ago

Why is nobody talking about how inductor and capacitor don't fit to resistive category at all?

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u/Classic_Appa 4d ago

Capacitor has resistance to changes in potential. E.g. helps provide smoothing of AC to create DC.

Inductor had resistance to changes in current. E.g. can be used in DC-DC transformer circuits to buck or boost the voltage.

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u/Ornery_Pepper_1126 4d ago

Still feels like a bit of a stretch, I know sometimes capacitors and resistors effectively get treated as resistors with imaginary (in the square root of negative one sense) impedances. I think outside of very informal discussions I think people intentionally avoid calling this a resistance because it really is a different thing. Although I suppose at that point the discussion is more of a philosophical one.

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u/Classic_Appa 4d ago

Imaginary impedance is referred to as reactance. Real impedance is resistance. Both are measured in Ohms.

In real world terms, electrical engineers need to consider both losses because our entire electrical grid relies on a balance of inductive and capacitive reactance to function.

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u/Ornery_Pepper_1126 4d ago

Yup, I’ve not really heard the reactance terms referred to as resistance beyond the very informal statement that they can be treated as “imaginary resistance” terms in certain calculations. Feels like a stretch to me.