Sparks, Currents and Magnets

What this quiz asks

• Which unit is used to measure electric current?
• The pull of a magnet like this one is strongest at its two ends. What are those ends called?
• Push the north poles of two magnets together and they will pull towards each other.
• In a string of old-style fairy lights wired in series, what happens when one bulb breaks?
• Which metal is the best conductor of electricity at room temperature?
• The volt is named after which Italian physicist, who built the first electric battery in 1800?
• Does a bird perched on a single high-voltage power line get an electric shock?
• Select ALL of these metals that an ordinary fridge magnet will stick to.
• Using Ohm's law, what current flows through a 10-ohm resistor with 5 volts across it?
• Which Danish physicist noticed in 1820 that an electric current makes a nearby compass needle swing?
• A typical electromagnet loses nearly all its pull as soon as its current is switched off.
• What did Michael Faraday discover in 1831 by moving a magnet in and out of a coil of wire?
• Select ALL of these that are good electrical insulators.
• In the 'War of the Currents', Edison's direct current faced an alternating-current system backed by which businessman?
• In what year did Thomas Edison's Pearl Street power station start supplying electricity in New York?
• What does a transformer change in an alternating-current supply?
• Lodestone, the natural magnet known since ancient times, is a form of which mineral?
• Order these milestones in electricity and magnetism from earliest to most recent.
• What happens to the electrical resistance of a superconductor when it is cooled below its critical temperature?
• What does the farad, a unit named after Michael Faraday, measure?