ground node

[turingcomplete]

Hey everyone,

I am currently studying nodal analysis and just want to check my understanding of something. It says that the ground node has 0 potential, does that mean that charge at that position has 0 potential energy?, and if that's true then how do charges move past that node since they have 0 potential energy?

 

[Laplace]

How is a ground node different than any other node? If you charge a capacitor then connect one lead to the ground node and leave the other lead unconnected, does half the capacitor lose its charge? Or is the ground node just the reference point from which other voltages are measured? What would it take to make some other node the ground node?

 

[turingcomplete]

well i think that both ends of the capacitor must be connected to the ground to have a complete circuit. The ground node is a reference point for measurement of other voltages. to make another node the ground node, I suppose it must have 0 voltage.

 

[Laplace]

So the ground node has no magical affinity that sucks charge from a circuit (or a capacitor) to prevent current flow. I would think all that is required to make a node a ground node is to draw that little ground symbol on the node, although it would not be very useful to select a node that was not readily accessible throughout the circuit. Also, there can be only one ground node in a circuit.