Electrostatic potential

[Susie Lee 2I]

In class, Prof. Lavelle mentioned that polar molecules interact with an electrostatic potential. Can someone expand on this?

[Ryan Sydney Beyer 2B]

Electrostatic potential has everything to do with dipole moments, electronegativity, and partial charge. Electrostatic potential helps us to know the relative polarity of a molecule. Negative electrostatic potential corresponds to a attraction of a proton by the concentrated electron density in the molecule. Positive electrostatic potential corresponds to repulsion of the proton by the atomic nuclei in regions where low electron density exists. When a proton approaches a positive region of the molecule, the repulsive interaction results in increasing positive potential energy. When a proton approaches a negative region, an attractive interaction results in negative potential energy.