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How Micheal Jordan Jumps so high

Micheal Jordan didn't get the nickname "Air Jordan" for nothing. He is known for his ability to jump really high in order to perform epic slam dunks. How does he do this? Micheal Jordan stands 1.98 m tall and has a wingspan of 2.13 m. A basketball hoop is 3.05 m high; therefore, he has to jump about .16 m above the ground for his hand to reach the rim. Jordan is most famous for his dunk from the foul line which is 4.57 m from the basket. In order for him to successfully complete this projec

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The Many World Theory

The many worlds theory suggests that there are an infinite number of universes that exist outside of our own. This theory was developed by physicists studying quantum particles. In quantum physics some things can have properties of either particles or waves and there is no way to determine which one. This influenced the many world theory because in quantum mechanics things have a wave-particle duel nature, so each fate of a particle is carried out, but just in different universes. According

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Supersonic speed

As I was scrolling through Instagram, I came across a post by Nasa that said today, October 14th, 2017, is the 70th anniversary of supersonic flight. Supersonic flight is when something is traveling faster than the speed of sound, which is 343 m/s. Of course for the past 70 years this has only been done by noncommercial planes. Well, Nasa is currently working on making supersonic flight a reality for commercial planes. That would mean that you can travel from New York to Los Angeles in 2 hours.

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Force of a Linebacker

This weekend I watched a lot of football. Watching it this week made me realize how bad it must hurt to get hit by a 240+ pound linebacker. The average running back runs about 4.72 m/sec and has a mass of about 97.5 kg. If the linebacker stops the running back in 1 second, the force on the running back is about 460 newtons. Due to newtons third law, that same force is thrown onto the linebacker as well. A linebacker that is famous for his powerful tackles is James Harrison for the Pittsburgh Ste

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Hubble Space Telescope

The Hubble Space Telescope is a large telescope that was launched into space in 1990 and has been used to see images that were, before Hubble, too far to see. Just recently, on October 20th, Hubble captured an image of a twisted cosmic knot in the constellation cancer as shown in the image below. This is 250 million light years away. A cosmic knot is what occurs when two galaxies collide to form a new galaxy. This galaxy, NGC 2623, stretches approximately 50000 light years from end to end. When

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Work, Energy, Power Summary

The last unit we studied in AP Physics C was Work, Energy and Power. First we reviewed the concept of work and how it equal to force*displacement. In a calculus based physics class however Work is also equal to the integral of force with respect to displacement. This means that the area under a Force vs Displacement graph is equivalent to the work done on the object. We also learned about Hooke's law and how it describes the relationship between the force of a spring and displacement. The slope

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Why Cars Slip

Car wheels have treading on the outside of each tire to increase friction between the car and the ground. Unfortunately, if the treading is worn out during the winter time the effectiveness is limited. Due to a lack of friction between the ground and the tire, and Newton's first law of motion, the car slides on the ice. The reason that the treading prevents slipping in the muddy and snowy conditions is because of the grooves on the wheel where the mud/snow can get into. The muddier or snowi

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Running Super Fast with Usain Bolt

Usain Bolt: the fastest man alive is 6'5" and 207 pounds. Being this large is rare for a sprinter because 207 pounds takes a lot of work to accelerate. To make up for this disadvantage he sprints quite differently than others.  His average stride is 2.44 meters long. This means that in a 100 meter race he only takes 41 strides. That saves a lot of time because the more times that you come in contact with the ground, the more time it takes to complete the race. In the World Championship in B

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Superionic Ice

Water and ice molecules on earth have a distinct molecular structure that gives it the properties that it has; however, under different surrounding pressures, the molecular structure can change, resulting in the formation of superionic water. Superionic water differs from the ice/water you and I know so well. "Regular" ice has molecules that form a V shape with two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. As pressure increases, these atoms get squeezed into different shapes. A property that superioni

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Is Math Invented or Discovered

Anybody who has ever taken a physics class knows that math plays a very essential role in solving problems that explain the laws of the universe. The question is: has math always existed and waits for us to discover it, or is math our own invented logic? There are many mathematical phenomena that are mysteriously found to come up in nature such as the Fibonacci sequence, and the numbers e and pi, that would be evidence of math being a preexisting language of the universe that we are continuing t

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This Week in Physics

During this week in AP Physics C, we have begun our studies in Dynamics. At first it was not too bad... then came air resistance. It seems like a pretty simple concept but it is in fact not. I don't have much experience in Calculus yet, so the differential equations are still pretty difficult to understand. There is still a good amount of time before the test for me to study this concept so hopefully I will get a good grasp on it before the test. Other than the differential equations, the confus

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Badminton Physics

Gym class is filled with exciting games every year. One of my favorites is badminton. One of the amazing things about badminton is that is uses a shuttlecock, or birdie, that is volleyed back and forth over the net. What's amazing about the shuttlecock is that it always flips on impact so it flies with the cork facing forward for the opposing team to hit it back. What makes it flip?  The mass of the shuttlecock is not evenly distributed. Most of the mass is in the cork part of it. The shutt

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Physics of walking

What makes us move? Well that's obvious. It's our feet, but how exactly does that happen. The answer is newtons third law of motion: when a force is applied to one object, that object automatically applies that same force back.    When your foot presses on the surface of the earth at an angle, the earth pushes back on your foot with the same force causing your body to accelerate forward. You might say, well then why does the earth not accelerate. That's because the earth is so big comp

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Rotation recap

Our last unit in AP physics c was rotational motion. In this unit we learned about rotational kinematics, dynamics and momentum. Rotational kinematic is very similar to translational kinematics because the same kinematic equations are used. The difference is that instead of displacement roation has the change in the angle. Instead of translational velocity and acceleration, rotational motion is calculated with angular velocity and acceleration. As far as dynamics go, rotational motion has a

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Top Lab

The Engineering design process is a series of steps that engineers go through to create a product of some sort. The process can be very repetitive at times while going through a process of trial and error. The lab that we did in class demonstrated the engineering design process. We were given two paper plates, six pennies, a pencil, and tape to create a spinning top. First we came up with an idea that we thought might work so we constructed a top that had a pencil through the center of a plate w

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Bowling physics

Bowling is one of my favorite activities to do during the winter time. I've tested a lot of different ways to throw, trying to come up with the most effective and consistent way to bowl strikes. I found that hitting the front pin straight on does not work every time because when it hits the front pin right down the middle, the outside pins often wont get touched leaving you with a pretty bad split.  The best thing to do is to hit the front pin but from an angle. What I mean by this is that

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What is Gravity?

For centuries scientists have studied the cause of gravity. Even though there have been theories that have proposed reasons for gravity, we still don't know for sure what exactly causes it. Isaac Newton developed the idea of gravity in the 17th century. He said that it was just a force of attraction that all objects naturally had toward each other. It wasn't until the early 1900's when Albert Einstein came up with his theory of relativity that explained the reason why objects attract each other.

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Physics in soccer

Cristiano Ronaldo is one of the best soccer players in the world. He is known for jumping extremely high to score headers. Headers are goals scored by using your head to hit the ball into the goal. This is a very useful skill in soccer because if you can jump higher than all the defenders than you can hit the ball without the defender getting in your way. Just how high does he jump? In a sports science analysis, Ronaldo jumped in mid air with his hands on his hips. The result was a height of 44

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Photons from the Sun

Light from the sun takes approximately 8 minutes to reach us on earth; however, that does not mean that those particular photons are 8 minutes old. The suns light is produced in the center of the sun when massive amounts of energy is released. The sun has a radius of 696,000 km. The distance between the edge of the sun and the earth is 149.6 million km. From this information you would come to the conclusion that it takes less time for a photon to reach the outer surface of the sun than it would

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Super Bowl LII

Super Bowl LII is nearly 2 hours away. The Patriots and the Eagles are both great teams with lots of talent. Not only will I be watching the game, but the physics of the game as well, being a physics student. Some things worth taking note of are the kinematics of kicking a field goal, the forces that are felt while getting tackled, the kinematics of deep passes made by Tom Brady and/or Nick Foles, among many others.  The minimum height needed to complete a successful field goal is 10 feet.

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Escape Velocity and Black Holes

Every massive object in space has an escape velocity. Escape velocity is the minimum velocity an object must have in order to escape the gravitational strength of a particular planet or any large body in space. The earths escape velocity is about 11.2 km/s. This means that an object must travel 11.2 km/s to escape its orbit around the earth. Reaching this velocity is a very big challenge when dealing with space travel.  The more mass a body has, the more gravitational attraction it has; therefor

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Electric Motors in toothbrushes

Want to make brushing your teeth even easier than it already is? Try using an electric toothbrush that uses an electric motor to rotate the brush back and forth to scrub your teeth better than ever. How does it work? On all the electric toothbrushes there is a battery at the bottom. This is used for a source of voltage which creates a current. As the current goes through the circuit, it reaches a point where it experiences a magnetic field. This creates a force upward on the circuit causing a ne

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MLB opening Day!

Major league baseball opened up the season this week and there were some exciting stats and physics involved in the 11 games that were played on Thursday the 29th. Here are some of the great physics highlights of opening day.  Giancarlo Stanton hit 2 home runs on his yankee debut. One of his home runs leads the league, so far, in exit velocity off the bat: 117.4 mph. With a launch angle of 19.8 degrees, its projected distance traveled is 426 feet.  Jordan Hicks of the St. Lous Cardinal

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Magnetism

Our latest unit in Physics was learning about magnetism. A magnetic field occurs when charged particles are moving. According to greek legend magnetism was discovered by a Shepard in a field as he suddenly felt a force of attraction coming from the ground as he wore shoes with iron on the bottom. The substance he found later became known as magnetite, after the place it was found, Magnesia. Another common magnetic substance that was well known was lodestone. This was used in ancient China by the

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Refracting vs Reflecting Telescopes

The first telescope to be invented was a refracting telescope. A refracting telescope works by using converging lens to collect light. A refracting telescope has a convex lens that bends the parallel light that is coming into it to a focal point. That focal point is where an image is formed of what is being observed. At that point is the eyepiece that you look through to see the focused image. This diagram shows the inside of a refracting telescope. A reflecting telescope was invented

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