In electromagnetism, Maxwell's equations are a set of four partial differential equations that describe the properties of the electric and magnetic fields and relate them to their sources, charge density and current density. These equations are used to show that light is an electromagnetic wave. Individually, the equations are known as Gauss's law, Gauss's law for magnetism, Faraday's law of induction, and Ampère's law with Maxwell's correction.
These four equations, together with the Lorentz force law are the complete set of laws of classical electromagnetism. The Lorentz force law itself was actually derived by Maxwell under the name of "Equation for Electromotive Force" and was one of an earlier set of eight Maxwell's equations . gauss law describes how electric charge can create and alter electric fields. In particular, electric fields tend to point away from positive charges, and towards negative charges. Gauss's law is the primary explanation of why opposite charges attract, and like repel: The charges create certain electric fields, which other charges then respond to via an electric force.
Gauss's law for magnetism states that magnetism is unlike electricity in that there are not distinct "north pole" and "south pole" particles (such particles, which exist in theory only, would be called magnetic monopoles) that attract and repel the way positive and negative charges do. Instead, north poles and south poles necessarily come as pairs (magnetic dipoles). In particular, unlike the electric field which tends to point away from positive charges and towards negative charges, magnetic field lines always come in loops, for example pointing away from the north pole outside of a bar magnet but towards it inside the magnet.
An Wang's magnetic core memory (1954) is an application of Ampere's law. Each core is one bit.Faraday's law of induction describes how a changing magnetic field can create an electric field. This is, for example, the operating principle behind many electric generators: Mechanical force (such as the force of water falling through a hydroelectric dam) spins a huge magnet, and the changing magnetic field creates an electric field which drives electricity through the power grid.
Ampère's law with Maxwell's correction states that magnetic fields can be generated in two ways: By electrical current (this was the original "Ampère's law") and by changing electric fields. The idea that a magnetic field can be induced by a changing electric field follows from the modern concept of displacement current which was introduced to maintain the solenoidal nature of Ampère's law in a vacuum capacitor circuit. This modern displacement current concept has the same mathematical form as Maxwell's original displacement current. Maxwell's original displacement current applies to polarization current in a dielectric medium and it sits adjacent to the modern displacement current in Ampère's law.