When a wire carrying an electric current is placed in a magnetic field, each of the moving charges, which comprise the current, experiences the Lorentz force, and together they can create a macroscopic force on the wire (sometimes called the Laplace force). By combining the Lorentz force law above with the definition of electric current, the following equation results, in the case of a straight stationary wire in a homogeneous field: F = I ℓ ℓ × × B , where ℓ is a vector whose magnitude is the length of the wire, and whose direction is along the wire, aligned with the direction of the conventional current I.