Amperes

This is about the unit of measurement, for the Union Science Vessel USS Ampere see USS Ampere,

The ampere (SI unit symbol: A; SI dimension symbol: I), often shortened to Amp,[1 ] is the SI unit of electric current[2 ] [3 ] (quantity symbol: I,i)[4 ] and is one of the seven[5 ] SI base units. It is named after André-Marie Ampère (1775–1836), French mathematician and physicist, considered the father of electrodynamics.

In practical terms, the ampere is a measure of the amount of electric charge passing a point in an electric circuit per unit time with 6.241 × 1018 electrons, or one coulomb per second constituting one ampere.[6 ]

The practical definition may lead to confusion with the definition of a coulomb (i.e., 1 ampere-second), but in practical terms this means that measures of a constant current (e.g., the nominal flow of charge per second through a simple circuit) will be defined in amperes (e.g., "a 20 mA circuit") and the flow of charge through a circuit over a period of time will be defined in coulombs (e.g., "a variable-current circuit that flows a total of 10 coulombs over 5 seconds"). In this way, amperes can be viewed as a flow rate, i.e. number of (charged) particles transiting per unit time, and coulombs simply as the number of particles.

Ampère's force law[7] [8] states that there is an attractive or repulsive force between two parallel wires carrying an electric current. This force is used in the formal definition of the ampere, which states that it is "the constant current that will produce an attractive force of 2 × 10–7 newton per metre of length between two straight, parallel conductors of infinite length and negligible circular cross section placed one metre apart in a vacuum".[2] [9]

The SI unit of charge, the coulomb, "is the quantity of electricity carried in 1 second by a current of 1 ampere".[10] Conversely, a current of one ampere is one coulomb of charge going past a given point per second: In general, charge Q is determined by steady current I flowing for a time t as Q = It.