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Electricity lights up our world, but where does it come from? See more nuclear power pictures.
Humans have an intimate relationship with electricity, to the point that it's virtually impossible to separate your life from it. Sure, you can flee from the world of crisscrossing power lines and live your life completely off the grid, but even at the loneliest corners of the world, electricity exists. If it's not lighting up the storm clouds overhead or crackling in a static spark at your fingertips, then it's moving through the human nervous system, animating the brain's will in every flourish, breath and unthinking heartbeat.
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When the same mysterious force energizes a loved one's touch, a stroke of lightning and a George Foreman Grill, a curious duality ensues: We take electricity for granted one second and gawk at its power the next. More than two and a half centuries have passed since Benjamin Franklin and others proved lightning was a form of electricity, but it's still hard not to flinch when a particularly violent flash lights up the horizon. On the other hand, no one ever waxes poetic over a cell phone charger.
Electricity powers our world and our bodies. Harnessing its energy is both the domain of imagined sorcery and humdrum, everyday life -- from Emperor Palpatine toasting Luke Skywalker, to the simple act of ejecting the "Star Wars" disc from your PC. Despite our familiarity with its effects, many people fail to understand exactly what electricity is. When put to the question, even acclaimed inventor Thomas Edison merely defined it as "a mode of motion" and a "system of vibrations."
In this article, we'll try to provide a less slippery answer. We'll illuminate just what electricity is, where it comes from and how humans bend it to their will.
For our first stop, we'll start small -- very small. The roots of electricity take place inside the atom itself.
