electric current

noun, Electricity

the time rate of flow of electric charge, in the direction that a positive moving charge would take and having magnitude equal to the quantity of charge per unit time: measured in amperes.

Also called current, electricity.

Origin

1830-40

Examples from the web for electric current

We here become acquainted with a new source of work, the electric current which decomposes water.
The convection generates an electric current and, as a result, a magnetic field.
On the planet's surface, extra currents of solar particles drive extra electric current through power lines and heat them up.
The acupuncturist inserts more than a dozen needles and runs a low electric current through them.
Then a mild electric current is turned on for five minutes, driving the pilocarpine into the skin.
His code used short and long pulses of electric current to represent letters of the alphabet.
They also tested the pantograph, the device that carries electric current from the overhead lines to the train.
Packets of molten iron rise, cool and sink within the core, and generate an electric current.
As glucose molecules release electrons, and oxygen molecules absorb them, an electric current flows.
Such electrons can move about and, if they all move in the same direction, create an electric current.

British Dictionary definitions for electric current

electric current

noun

another name for current (sense 8)