Can an electrostatic charge be formed by an object having more or less protons?
It can, but it is unlikely. Protons are much more tightly bound in nuclei than electrons. Electrons are most free to exchange, so macroscopic objects are most often charged by having electron surpluses or deficits. When positive charges are exhanged instead, it is more as if part of the object is actually exchanged (rather than a tiny mass of electrons), because protons have substantially more mass. Also, do realize that proton count in the nucleus identifies the element of each atom. If a block of carbon and a block of silicon were to exchange protons to make the silicon more positive, some carbon would need to somehow accept becoming boron, and the destination silicon atoms would need to somehow accept becoming phosphorous. Atoms don’t usually swap element type unless nuclear reactions occur.
