The hell Is that little cilinder on any circuit I see?

As anything in life tends to be more and more hooked to technologic operations, there will be a lot of practical circuits, boards and what not of electronical components. These are not here just because the assembler wanted to put them there, because they have specifical reasons for Its use, which migth vary depending on the kind of network they're connected in, their polarity (Yes, like magnets) and Its surrounding components. It's with this that we begin to talk about such beautiful pieces of technology:

The magic behind energy storage:

The capacitor is one of the many elements that makes part in the Passive Components family (Such examples of other members are resistors and inductors). The term passive refers to one of Its characteristic, which Is that It can't generate energy by Itself, though It just storages It for a definite amount of time and them disipates It slowly. Well, how does It all happen? These little (Or not so little in some variations) cilyndric objects are formed of two layers, which are separated, either by an insulating material or just by void, though connected by the electric field that is generated between them when It's operating. Every time that these layers are subject to some kind of voltage (Or Electric Potential Difference) the capacitor will acquire a charge (Q) that will be present in both layers, one in a negative form (Negative load) and the other Its positive counter part.

Also, when describing the functioning of the capacitor, It's usual to mention two cycles that happen: The cycles of charge and discharge, the first one referring to the period of time in which electrical tension is introduced to the layers of the component and discharge the time that takes when there's no more current from an external source flowing to the device and It's slowly losing that storaged energy.

The principle that this property of the capacitor bases itself in Is the fact that they resist immediate changes in current, meaning that any kind of current that enters into the component won't go in or away that easily, It first will have to pass through the charge and discharge cycles mentioned early, representing that the curve of increment or decrement in these periods of time is linear.

In The Next article of this series, we'll explain some basic equations and how to choose your capacitors in a manner that they can have greater amounts of time in their charge and discharge cycles.