CS-STEM Network

Simplest Circuit

Mini Project World's Simplest Circuit

Find the following two components in your kit:

Coin Cell Battery
LED Light

Project Goal:

Figure out how to get the LED to light up, using only the coin cell battery.
No additional components should be needed

When you're done:

Keep a log of your journey through the lessons! This can be a notebook, a binder, or digital document. You will see places in the lessons to record specific log entries where you see “Log Entry” with the appropriate section numbers where they are located.
Log Entry 1.1: What must happen for the LED to light up? Be specific! Which areas on the components that need to touch?

Explanation

The LED will light as long as the longer lead ("leg") is touching the side of the battery marked "positive" (+ sign, usually on top) and the shorter one is touching the side of the battery marked "negative" (- sign, usually on the bottom). The edges of a coin cell are often part of the positive side.

Note that the LED only lights up when both the positive and negative sides are connected at the same time, forming a complete loop.

This is because electricity only travels "around" complete paths.

Complete Loop

The LED gets the power to emit light from electrons passing through it. In that sense, it is similar to a water- or windmill.

Those devices borrow physical energy from passing water or air.

...the water has to be flowing. Similarly, electrical devices only work if electricity flows through them.

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Simplest Circuit

Mini Project World's Simplest Circuit

Find the following two components in your kit:

Explanation