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Using reciprocals

There are several situations in physics where you need to manipulate reciprocals (‘one over something’). A familiar application involves combining resistances in parallel, where slips in calculation are all too common

At GCSE (or equivalent) you will have learned that resistances add up in series, while in parallel the resistance of the entire circuit decreases as branches are added — which can seem odd and unexpected. Here we look at the physics and mathematics behind this situation, and explain the use of reciprocals in the calculations.

First, a quick recap of circuit theory.

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