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Published May 1, 1918 | public
Journal Article Open

The Structure of an Electromagnetic Field

Bateman, H.

Abstract

This elementary field corresponds to a state of affairs in which electric charges of a concentrated form are created and travel along straight lines with the velocity of light, the directions of these lines being specified by the different values of the unit vector s. Whenever a concentrated electric charge is created an amount of electricity which will just compensate it is fired out in all directions and provides an elementary 'aether' which is the seat of the electromagnetic field of the concentrated charge. A concentrated electric charge and its elementary aether lie at any instant on a sphere whose centre is at the point where these charges originated [1]; if now this point moves with a velocity less than the velocity of light the different spheres bearing electricity that exist at time t do not intersect and if the arbitrary function f(a) is never zero there will be a sphere through each point of space so that our elementary aethers will fill the whole of space; if however the function f(a) is sometimes zero, for example if it is zero when a is less than ao, then the elementary aethers will not fill the whole of space.

Additional Information

Copyright © 1918 by the National Academy of Sciences. Communicated by A. A. Noyes, March 18, 1918.

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August 21, 2023
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October 16, 2023