Solution:
To calculate the work required to separate the plates of the capacitor, let’s analyze the situation step by step:
1. Initial Setup
- The capacitor has:
- Plate area =
- Initial separation =
- Initial potential difference =
- After charging, the battery is disconnected, so the charge on the plates remains constant.
The charge stored in the capacitor is given by:
where is the capacitance:
Thus, the charge is:
2. Energy Stored in the Capacitor
The energy stored in the capacitor is:
Substituting :
Initially, the energy is:
When the separation is increased to , the capacitance decreases to:
The energy becomes:
Since the charge is constant and :
Substitute and :
3. Work Done to Separate the Plates
The work done to separate the plates is equal to the increase in energy:
Substitute the values:
Final Answer:
The work required to separate the plates is:
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