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- Electrons need to travel past the metal ions in the filament.
- Each time it collides with a metal ion, it loses energy.
- This energy is transferred to the metal ion, making it vibrate more.
- This makes the wire hotter.
- This energy transfer is what we refer to as resistance.
- As the wire gets hotter, the metal ions vibrate more.
- This makes it harder for the electrons to pass through because there are more
frequent collisions between the electrons and the vibrating metal ions.
- This means that the resistance of the filament increases as it gets hotter,
because the electrons lose more energy.