Electrical engineering

Circuits, transformers, semiconductors, and power transmission

What is electrical engineering?

Electrical engineering is the branch of engineering concerned with designing and building systems that use electricity — power generation and distribution, electronic devices, and the circuits that make modern technology work, all built on the physics covered in the Electromagnetism article.

Circuits: the basic building block

An electrical circuit is a closed loop that allows electric current to flow, generally including a power source, conductors carrying the current, and components that do something useful with it. Basic components include resistors (which limit current flow), capacitors (which store electrical energy temporarily), and inductors (which resist changes in current) — combining these simple components in different arrangements makes possible everything from a simple flashlight circuit to the most advanced electronics.

Power generation and distribution

Electrical engineers design the systems that generate electricity (in power plants, using generators that convert mechanical motion into electrical energy) and distribute it efficiently over long distances to homes and businesses, using high-voltage transmission lines that minimize energy loss over distance.

Electronics and digital systems

Electrical engineering also covers electronics — the design of circuits using components like transistors and integrated circuits (introduced in the Computer Science and Computer Engineering articles) to process signals, control devices, and perform computation. This overlaps closely with computer engineering, which focuses specifically on the digital, computing side of electronics.

Why electrical engineering matters

Electrical engineering underlies the entire modern electrical grid, every electronic device in daily use, telecommunications systems, and countless industrial control systems — it's difficult to find a piece of modern technology that doesn't depend directly on electrical engineering somewhere in its design.