Advanced Undergraduate Laboratory

Department of Physics

University of Toronto

C3D: Conductivity in Less Than Three Dimensions

Any field is constrained by the geometry of the space in which it exists. Measuring such fields allows one to determine a wide range of physical properties: everything from the depth of the local water table to setting limits on the size and existence of extra space-time dimensions.

This experiment studies electric currents and potential patterns in conductors with different dimensionality. Resistivity surveying is a common application, but there are many areas of physics (e.g. graphene and other thin films) where fields do not propagate freely in the familiar 3 spatial dimensions.


Write-Up in PDF Format or Microsoft Word Format.

(The experiment is currently located in MP226; last write-up revision: July 2016)

Additional Resources

Photo of Eugenia Tam, a third year Engineering Sciences Physics Option student, working on Conductivity in Three Dimensions

Eugenia Tam, a third year Engineering Sciences Physics Option student, working on Conductivity in Three Dimensions

Last updated on 9 September 2020