Passivity (engineering)

Passivity is a property of engineering systems, most commonly used in electronic engineering and control systems. A passive component, depending on field, may either refer to a component that consumes (but does not produce) energy, or to a component that is incapable of power gain. A component that is not passive is called an active component. An electronic circuit consisting entirely of passive components is called a passive circuit (and has the same properties as a passive component).

Thermodynamic passivity

In control systems and circuit network theory, a passive component or circuit is one that consumes energy, but does not produce energy. Under this methodology, voltage and current sources are considered active, while transistors, resistors, tunnel diodes, glow tubes, capacitors, and other dissipative and energy-neutral components are considered passive. For memoryless two-terminal elements, this means that the current-voltage characteristics lie in the first and third quadrant. Circuit designers will sometimes refer to this class of components as dissipative, or thermodynamically passive.
[edit] Incremental passivity
In circuit design, informally, passive components refer to ones that are not capable of power gain. Under this definition, passive components include capacitors, inductors, resistors, transformers, voltage sources, and current sources. They exclude devices like transistors, relays, glow tubes, tunnel diodes, and similar devices. Formally, for a memoryless two-terminal element, this means that the current-voltage characteristic is monotonically increasing. For this reason, control systems and circuit network theorists refer to these devices as locally passive, incrementally passive, increasing, monotone increasing, or monotonic. It is not clear how this definition would be formalized to multiport devices with memory -- as a practical matter, circuit designers use this term informally, so it may not be necessary to formalize it.

Answer the questions, based on the dialog above, and translate the answers.
Some answers will be found on the internet.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Current-voltage_characteristic

1. Where is Passivity most commonly used?

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2. Depending on a field, what may a passive componet refer to?

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3. Where is a Passivity most commonly used?

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4. How is a componet that is not passive called?

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5. In control systems and circuits what is a network theory on a passive componet or circuit?

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6. Under this methodology, which sourses are considered active?

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7. Name four dissipative and energy-neutral components that are considered passive.

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8. What is a current–voltage characteristic?
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9. Why do Electrical engineers use these charts?

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10. How do these Engineers commonly refer to these characteristic charts?

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