How and why a charged rod bends a stream of water?

Answer 1

A charged rod either has a positive or negative charge. Since water is polar, meaning it has more electrons on one side than the other, bringing a charged rod near water will force the water molecules to rearrange so that it will be attracted to the rod. A positively charged rod would attract the oxygen side of the water molecules, while a negatively charged rod would attract the hydrogen side.

This will work for any polar molecule.

Answer 2

Water molecules are polarized, meaning the H2O molecular geometry is such that, even when the molecule is neutral (it is not ionized), one end of the molecule tends to be more negatively charged while the other end tends to be more positively charged. As a water molecule passes through a magnetic field, the molecule will align itself with the field, with the exact orientation depending upon the direction of the field and of the direction of the water molecule's trajectory.

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As a falling water molecule passes through a magnetic field, the charged side closest to the magnet will experience a slightly greater force than the oppositely charged side further away from the magnet, because the strength of the magnetic force is inversely proportional to the square of the distance. The imbalance in electromagnetic forces creates a net lateral force, and the water molecule is therefore deflected sideways.

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This magnetic force difference is infinitesimally small, but you must consider two things. First, the mass of the molecule (and thus its inertia) is also very small, and therefore it takes only a tiny force to deflect just one molecule. More importantly, the electromagnetic force overall is 1036 times stronger than the gravitational force, and therefore even an infinitesimally small electromagnetic force can overwhelm a gravitational force. Therefore the minute difference of electromagnetic forces is sufficient to slightly bend the trajectory of the falling molecule.

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With each molecule experiencing the same phenomenon, a stream of water passing through a magnetic field will be very slightly deflected due to the magnetic field.

Answer 3

the charged object attracts opposite charge in the water to the side nearest it, inducing an electrical dipole charge in the stream of water. this induced dipole charge is attracted to the charged object, dragging the stream of water with it deflecting the flow of the stream.