Thursday, May 22, 2014

The Top 10 Laws of Physics




1.)    Newton’s First Law -

“Every object continues in a state of rest or of uniform speed in a straight line unless acted on by a nonzero net force.”

Another way to say this is that an object at motion with stay in motion and an object at rest will stay at rest unless acted on by an outside force. The prime example of this law is where someone has set up a dinner ware set and pulls the table cloth out from underneath it. The dishes stay in their restful state because their inertia is greater than the force acted on it.

This same concept applies to objects in motion. An object at motion with continue to move without turning or gaining speed.  This was the concept demonstrated by our hovercraft lab in the beginning of the year.  Although, this concept is mainly evident in space, we were able to recreate a friction-less environment by keeping the craft floating above the ground.

2.)    Newton’s Second Law –

We learned all about Newton's Second Law and its behavior towards objects that may have an unbalanced force on them in the air. Newton's second law states that the acceleration of an object is dependent upon two variables - the net force acting upon the object and the mass of the object. The acceleration of an object depends directly upon the net force acting upon the object, and inversely upon the mass of the object. So as force acting on an increase, the acceleration of that object increases. As the mass of the object increases, the acceleration of that object decreases.

In other words acceleration is directly proportionate to force and inversely proportionate to mass. The equation below uses Fnet which can also be determined by mass times acceleration.

A = Fnet/m

3.)    Newton’s Third Law of Motion

Newton's third law of motion states that, "for every action there is an equal but opposite reaction." In the beginning of this lesson, we start to understand the concept of forces and interactions. We grasp a concept of forces such as pushing or pulling, but realize that no force or interaction occurs alone. Every force is part of an interaction between one thing and another. For example when a boxer uses his force to punch a large punching bag, the first force on the bag is from the boxer's fist, which causes the bag to dent. However, the punching bag also applies a force back on the boxer's fist. If the boxer was to punch a lighter tissue that was in midair, then the tissue could only exert how much force was exerted on it. This is why an interaction requires a pair of forces action on two separate objects.


After understanding this concept, we then moved to learn about Newton's Third Law of Motion and how it cooperated with action and reaction pairs. Newton's Third Law is summarized by stating, "whenever one object exerts a force on a second object, the second object exerts an equal and opposite force on the first." But how do we grasp this concept using demonstrations. For example, when you walk, you interact with the floor. You push against the floor and the floor pushes against you. These pairs of forces are the same. So when stating "YOU PUSH on FLOOR" (This being the action) "FLOOR PUSHES on YOU" (This being the reaction) Next, this concept goes further in depth, which helps you understand how actions and reactions work when two object differentiate in mass. The book states, "As strange as it may seem, a falling object pulls upward on Earth  with as much force as Earth pulls downward on the object. The resulting acceleration of the falling object is evident, while the upward accelration of the Earth is too small to detect." When am apple is falling out of a tree the apple is pulling the Earth upward as much as the Earth is pulling the apple downward. Therefore "EARTH PUSHES APPLE DOWN" = "APPLE PUSHES EARTH UP." And to an extent we learn about how force is related to mass and acceleration proportionately with the demonstration of a cannon and a cannonball. When using the formula (F/m) = a, we know that if you have a smaller force then you are going to have a greater acceleration, and if you have a smaller acceleration you are going to have a greater force. We see this when demonstration a cannon firing. The force exerted against the recoiling cannon is just as great as the force that drives the cannonball inside the barrel. During the class we also played a game of tug of war that helped us understand the concept of forces applied. The guys competed against the girls in the game of tug of war, with one exception the guys were wearing socks on the hardwood floor. Anyways, the girls one because they were able to put more force on the ground which allowed them to pull harder.

4.)    Rotational Inertia–

The definition of tangential speed is the direction of the motion tangent to the circumference of the circle. We learned that tangential and linear speed can be used interchangeably. Rotational speed, however, involves the number of rotations or revolutions per unit of time. We used these two definitions with many everyday problems and scenarios that correlate appropriately. The real life exercise we used was the merry go round question. All of the fine physics students in Ms. Lawrence's class embarked on a journey to the outside world, were we lined up and locked arms. We learned now that even though the inside center point of the rotating line, trying to represent the merry go round, the students who were on the outside of the line were moving at a faster speed in order to cover the same ground as the students on the inside. This is due to the fact that they have the same rotational speed because they are connected, but have different tangential speeds because the outside needs to cover more distance than the inside.

5.)    Law of Gravity and Free Fall –

This animation demonstrates that when an two objects are in free fall they hit the ground at the same time disregarding the mass difference of each object. It also demonstrates that when two objects are dropped and are encountered with air resistance they most likely will not hit the ground at the same time. This for many reasons. One reason being that each object may have a different surface area that causes more or less air resistance. Another reason is that they will have different mass and have a stronger force of gravity pulling them towards the Earth.


6.)    Law of Conservation of Momentum

Momentum is simply inertia in motion. Or can also be defined as Momentum = (Mass x Velocity) We learned that a moving object can have a large momentum if either its mass or velocity are large or if both its mass and its velocity are large. One example we used in class was comparing a truck and a small car and seeing how their mass and speed compared to their momentum proportionately. Next, we learned about momentum. We learned that if the momentum of an object changes. then either the mass or the velocity or both changes. This is shown by the quantity force times time interval, or, Impulse = Ft. The greater the impulse exerted on something, the  greater will be the change in momentum. So therefor, Impulse = change in momentum. One example that really helped me grasp this concept was the example that showed that if a boxer "rolled with the punches then the impulse would be less."  This was shown as (little F)(BIG t)= (Big F)(little t) This is where the force over a greater time period would be less as opposed to the force being greater over a shorter time period. Then, we moved into the concept of objects bouncing. We learned that when an object hits something it has an initial impact and if it is not absorbed, has another impact that makes the object bounce off. This creates two forces on the object if the force is not absorbed. The demonstration where Mrs. Lawrence was in the rolling chair and threw and caught a heavy object and she continued to move backwards really helped me understand this more in depth. The final thing we looked at in this unit was the conservation of momentum.
From Newton's second law, we learned that to accelerate an object, a net force must be applied to it. This was generally the same in this chapter except written and explained differently. If we wished to change the momentum we would have to change the impulse. The demonstration the Mrs. Lawrence used where two cue balls were hit together and one stopped and the other kept moving helped me understand in real life terms of how momentum is transferred.

7.)    Law of Conservation of Mass

This Law states that matter cannot be created nor destroyed only transformed. The mass is transformed when the transformation is preformed and the matter stays the same.

8.)    Law of Conservation of Electric Charge
When dealing with electric current it is important to understand how conductors and insulators work.  A conductor is a when any material that make the electrons “loose” and transfer energy between it. A good conductor for example, is any type of metal. Electrical wires in circuits consist of metal to allow the electrons to flow through the wire and bring energy to the source. On the outside of the wire is a coating that is an insulator. An insulator is an item that does not allow electrons to pass through it.
9.)    Coulomb’s Law

Coulomb’s Law deals with an electric charge over a distance.
“Coulomb's law states that the electrical force between two charged objects is directly proportional to the product of the quantity of charge on the objects and inversely proportional to the square of the separation distance between the two objects.”

10.) Ohm's Law 

Ohm's law states that “the current through a conductor between two points is directly proportional to the potential difference across the two points.”

V=I/R

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