Induced polarization

Have you ever played with a magnet and some metal objects? When you place the magnet close to the metal, the metal will get attracted to the magnet, right? This is because of something called magnetism.

Induced polarization is a lot like magnetism, but instead of metal and magnets, we are talking about electricity and rocks. You see, rocks have tiny particles inside them, called atoms, that have a positive and negative charge. When we add electricity to the rock, the negative charge of the electricity can make the positive charges inside the rock shift or move around. This movement of charges is called polarization.

Now, let's pretend that our rock is underground, and we don't know what's inside it. We want to learn more about the rock without digging it up, so we use a special tool called a geophysical survey. We can send an electric current into the ground and measure how the rock reacts to the electricity. Based on the way the rock responds, we can make a guess about what kinds of minerals or materials are inside the rock.

So, in summary, induced polarization is when we add electricity to rocks to make their positive charges shift around. We can use this technique to learn more about the rocks without having to dig them up.