Jump to content

Blogs

Our community blogs

  1. This year was a good year in physics. I learned a lot about a bunch of different subjects. One of my favorite subjects was kinematics because it applies to a lot of different things. Throughout these blogs posts I used a lot of different kinematic references. My personal favorite was the drifting post because not only is drifting awesome, it can apply to so many different things in physics.

    images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSfxQjY1LogJ7wwWN1Er-dRRqFaZVNzVwyTFD3KWYYwti0q3ABhCw

    The year has been really good though. I really enjoyed all of the labs we did because they were fun and they applied to everything we learned. Good luck to all of next years physics students.

  2. Few people are surprised by the fact that an asteroid, the size of Mt. Everest, could do a lot of damage when it hits the Earth. And it is not really surprising that such bodies are out there; every few years, there is a newspaper headline about a "near miss" in which an object misses the Earth by "only a few million miles." But why should an asteroid impact cause an explosion? It was made of rock, not dynamite. And why such a big explosion? But then, what is an explosion, after all?

    An explosion occurs when a great deal of energy is "released" into a small volume in a very short period of time. It doesn't matter what the source of the energy is; it could be chemical (stored in food), or kinetic (the result of motion).

    However, nuclear bombs are the most devastating of them all and can cause some serious damage in its surroundings The dominant effects of a nuclear weapon (the blast and thermal radiation) are the same physical damage mechanisms as conventional explosives, but the energy produced by a nuclear explosive is millions of times more per gram and the temperatures reached are in the tens of mega kelvins. Nuclear weapons are quite different from regular weapons because of the huge amount of explosive energy they can put out and the different kinds of effects they make, like high temperatures and nuclear radiation.

    The devastating impact of the explosion does not stop after the initial blast, as with regular explosives. A cloud of nuclear radiation travels from the epicenter of the explosion, causing an impact to lifeforms even after the heat waves have ceased. The radiation can cause genetic mutation, radiation poisoning, and death. because of this harmful effects, during the cold war people were traumatized to live in a time period where atom bombs seemed to make the power of the country greater and unfortunately it wasnt a success

  3. Hello once again audience! Today I'm going to talk about a duo of absolutely awesome government assassins from The Avengers, Black Widow and Hawkeye (also known as Natasha Romanov and Clint Barton). Now you might be thinking, what's so super about these two people? They are just people, no super powers or anything. Well I can tell you that they are in fact super with their accuracy.

    Let's start with Hawkeye. Like his name says, his eyes are like a hawk's. But how precise is that?

    Precise enough to shoot a flying alien space craft without even looking! Hawkeye's power is this excellent accuracy with his bow and arrow.

    Next we'll move on to Black Widow. At first she seems like any other pretty girl. Wrong!

    She learned super self defense techniques with, like Hawkeye, excellent accuracy.

    Now, many superheroes seem completely unrealistic and could never be alive in real life. But Black Widow and Hawkeye are like real people. The government and other people have assassins just like the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents in Avengers. The CIA, FBI, SWAT, you name it. These super characters aren't as fictional as they seem. Lil' Bretz singing off.

  4. Blog smithr7

    • 1
      entry
    • 0
      comments
    • 1097
      views

    Recent Entries

    Complete Electricity and Magnetism Review

    Reviews + Quizzes + Exams

    [ATTACH=CONFIG]360[/ATTACH]

    Link:

    https://market.android.com/details?id=air.com.example.EMReview&hl=en

    Are you disappointed with your last E/M Review purchase? Was it incomplete and/or misleading by giving the wrong answers? Well look no further, as you have stumbled upon an intuitive and complete review of the physics involved with electricity and magnetism.This app will improve your understanding over Calculus-Based and Fundamentals of PHYSICS: Electricity and Magnetism.Whether you are a college student seeking help throughout the semester or a graduate preparing for a tough exam, this is the app for you.The in-depth review will quickly grab your attention with general principles, important concepts, equations, and real world applications.

    After the review, quiz yourself on each topic with many multiple choice questions.

    Standardized Scoring coming soon...- 2 - University Exams are available for additional testing - Keys are posted to check your answers.

    Final exam coming soon...All Topics Covered:

    -Electric Charges and Forces

    -The Electric Field

    -Gauss's Law

    -The Electric Potential

    -Potential and Field

    -Current and Resistance

    -Fundamentals of Circuits - DC circuits

    -The Magnetic Field

    -Electromagnetic Induction

    -Electromagnetic Fields and Waves

    -AC Circuits

  5. Blog keeth

    • 1
      entry
    • 0
      comments
    • 974
      views

    Recent Entries

    Finding out ways and means of how you can pursue your higher education with the high costs can be a cause of concern for both parents and students. But with proper research of the variousSchool Grants schemes for financial aid or college grants will give you a solution especially because some of these aids include federal school grants where the students don’t have to pay the aid after graduation and it can be utilized to cover ant expenses while attending college. Federal grants is decided on the financial need of the student taking into account the amount that the family can offer in the section of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) report; so the student has to be perfectly honest when he fill up the FAFSA application form so that we will be eligible of receiving the federal grants. Once you have been awarded the grant, it is usually deposited in your student account, deposited into your bank or paid by check. The Pell Grant and the Federal Supplement Educational Opportunity Grant (FSEOG) are the two types of Federal Student Grants.

    In many colleges they may have funds set apart as student college grants beside the two Federal Student Grants mentioned above. The details of these college grants will be available in the school’s financial aid office which has to be followed up and taken advantage of as early as possible since most of these grants are very limited and gets distributed quickly. Filling up the application for the FAFSA is the first step that needs to be done to avail Federal Student Aid of any kind and over and above this; most schools have their own forms which will have to be filled provided that you qualify for any of the local or private financial aid that is available. Be sure that you know about your family’s financial resources as this information is of prime importance when it comes to deciding your real requirement for financial aid to avail such student grants. All student grants are reserved for students whose families deserve financial aid, it is worth mentioning that if you deserve such grants, it is worth looking into all avenues including student loans and work study

  6. Forces are everywhere and i never knew how many forces act upon a simple object until this unit in class! A force is a push or pull acting upon an object as a result of its coming into contact with another object. For the purpose of this blog post, i will use a basketball rolling down a hill because that is simple, and hey, its getting late.

    So the forces acting upon this object are the normal force, applied force and gravity force. The normal force is the force of a surface acting back on the object so in this case it is the ground pushing on the basketball to keep it up. Secondly, the applied force is a force from a person or another object so there would be an applied force if i were to go up to this basketball and push it down the hill. Lastly, gravity force is what pulls the object to the center of the earth. This is equal to the weight of the object because it is found by multiplying mass times 9.81 N/Kg.

    There is also friction, which is exerted by the surface when the ball (in this case, basketball) rolls. Air resistance is another force most people don't think to consider, and this force is opposite of which ever direction the ball is rolling. As you can see, there are a lot of different kinds of forces, and i have nobody but mr. fullerton to thank for teaching me all of them!

  7. Everyone knows that one of their favorite past times is sitting in front of the television and watching movies, shows, or playing video games. However with this almost motionless, lazy activity comes a great deal of static physics and mechanics.

    When you are sitting down enjoying whatever show it is you may be watching, you actually have several forces acting on you concurrently. For example, by sitting on the couch with no extra weight on you, your weight is equivalent to the normal force, or the force of the couch on you. In addition to the force of the couch of you, if you are leaning on an arm or laying down, a similar force acts on you, except at an angle or incline. The general rule for laying on the couch watching television is that whatever force you exert on an object, that object exerts the same force in the opposite direction, or 180 degrees around.

    Next time you sit down and watch some television, remember that you are under the rules of static physics!

    • 1
      entry
    • 1
      comment
    • 1038
      views

    Recent Entries

    The question is this:

    A hiker sets out on a trek heading (N35degreesE) at a place of 5.0 km/h for 48.0 mins. He then heads west at 4.5 km/h for 40.0 min. Finally, he heads (N30degreesW) for 6.0 km, until he reaches a campground 1.5 hours later.

    A) Find his total displacement using vector components.

    SO, i used Ax = 4.0 cos 35degrees = 3.27

    Ay = 4.0 sin 35degrees = 2.29

    Then I looked at the answers and it said I should have used the angle 55 degree angle instead of the 35. How do I figure out when to use which angle?

  8. This week at The Lilac Festival, my mother and I experienced loads of different noises all at the same time. With loads of security, we heard lots of sirens passing us, creating the Doppler Effect. The Doppler Effect is the shift of frequency of a wave when a source moves past.

    As a source with sound, such as a police car or security car, moves towards you, the frequency is smaller, which creates more of a high pitched sound. While moving, the frequency then begins to increase and after it passes you, the frequency is larger, making a lower sound.

    To the human ear, the frequency increases quickly with the source, so the sound sounds like "neeeowwww." With so much chaos and Doppler Effect at the lilac festival, my mom and I decided to give our ears a break and go home early.

    • 2
      entries
    • 1
      comment
    • 1158
      views

    Recent Entries

    sarabuckbee
    Latest Entry

    So as you can see from the title I have no idea what to write about this week but hey I'm gonna wing it!

    Yeah, so I have almost no clue whats going on right now because of the fact that the whole derrivative thing looks like a divide sign so I'm always thinking we have to divide things. And theres just too many of those triangle signs as well. I wish I learned some of this in Pre Calc or decided to take Math Anaysis. I think I would be much better off if I did.

    Otherwise this class is slightly interesting and not too bad with the basic kinematics sparingly weaved in. This test coming up on Friday will be the true deciding factor on whether I'm going to stay in this class or not...

    I'm gonna be a business major, it doesn't take calculus based physics to fire someone. Just saying :star:

  9. Dodgeball

    • 0
      entries
    • 0
      comments
    • 1502
      views

    No blog entries yet

  10. midnightpanther
    Latest Entry

    Everyday at school we have to climb all of those stairs to get to the upper levels of the school and I get exhausted from it, and so I came up with a brilliant solution that no one really thinks is a good idea. You just get rid of the stairs and we have ladders, and some of them can just sit still and other ones can be like moving up or down so you just grab on and you are changing floors. The physics here is that right when you grab on, you accelerate either up or down, like when you are on an elevator. So, if people felt bad about their weight they could weigh themselves right when the grab on the ones going down which accelerates them downward so they would weigh less than they would when standing on the ground normally.

    • 3
      entries
    • 2
      comments
    • 1850
      views

    Recent Entries

    CMaggio
    Latest Entry

    Lacrosse is a contact sport in which players use cradle and pass the ball to score. Players can use their bodies to check or delay other players on the field. Also, players can “check” other players’ sticks with their own sticks in order to loosen the ball from the stick’s pocket. I play attack so the sole goal of my playing is to shoot and score.

    The top arm exerts a pushing force on the shaft, the bottom arm a pulling force, creating a type of lever. This forces the head forwards which creates centripetal and the force propells the ball outward. And of course, after the ball finally leaves the stick, there is air friction. Also, the more kinetic energy the throw has, the great distance the ball will trave, especially with a shorter and lighter stick, the ball is much easier thrown.

    Lastly, when we lose possession or I am forced to play defense, when I hit an opponent, the force that I use will be equivalent to the force she applies to me.

    • 1
      entry
    • 1
      comment
    • 2189
      views

    Recent Entries

    Some bad language, but definitely funny...

  11. Working out is the act of building mucsle and exercising your body. In preforming acts of runnig lifting or endurance, you engage in a variety of physics topics including friction, resistence, energy, forces and momentum.

    For working out, the act of building mucsle demonstrates an example of resistance and or friction. When lifting heavy objects or moving in a forceful manor, it requires you to condemn in motion that essentialy tears the musles cause the force required is working out your mucsles and you gain strength when they grow back allowing you to deliver a greater force.

    In terms of energy, chemical energy is converted, therefor conserved and then transfered to the body in a new form of mechanical energy which allows you to move things and or run and exercise to get in shape. Continueing to expell energy requires more energy to keep up your endurance and allowing maximum potential to work out. By having stored energy or potential enrgy, you have the ability to move and then its transfered to kinetic energy in your work out secssion.

    In terms of momentum, bigger and more heavy objects when being lifted contribute a greater momentum against your body inhibiting a greater level or degree of diffuculty for bigger objects and will make more of an impact for you. Because of the more intensive strain it provides. Lesser momentum makes it easier to life and "no pain no gain" implies you will not see great results.

    Working out is an action that delivers wide diverse physics topics which are good to understand so you know what is happennning to yourself durring work outs.

  12. blog-0904411001368811827.pngWe all know Star Wars right? A common theme is battles in space with big ships blasting at each other. However, if the movies were based on actual science, you wouldnt hear anything. There's always big booms and laser sound effects, but if you think about it, sound cannot travel through space. Sound is a longitudinal wave, and can be looked at as such:

    ::: : : ::: : : ::::

    Longitudinal waves need a medium to travel through, and since space is nothing more than a vacuum, there is no medium, and therefore no sound could travel. Then Star Wars would be really boring, huh? Good thing George Lucas neglected his physics class. You should't though!

  13. Water skiing involves many different components of physics. The fundamentals of it are based mainly on angles and gravity. When you are trying to get up, you have to make sure you keep your ski at a certain angle so that the water pushes down on the ski, creating a downward force that enables you to stand up. Once the force of the water pushing up on the ski is equal to the force of gravity pulling down on the ski, you are able to stay on top of the water.

    Tension is also involved in water skiing because the rope from the boat to your hand pulls tightly, creating tension. When the tension in the rope is constant, you will be traveling at the same speed as the boat pulling you. However, since the rope from the boat to the water skier keeps you moving in a circular path. Since you are moving in a circular path, there is also centripetal force. When the centripetal force is high, the water skier may be moving faster than the boat itself.

  14. blog-0781799001371168878.jpgWe all knew this would come eventually, from a person like myself. Personally, I love pokemon videogames- they're fun, entertaining, and you can do so many different things in them. Much better that the televisions shows, for sure.

    While I was pondering how to tie in my nerdy-ness into a physics post, I came up with this. Hopefully it's not too terrible :D

    So, to begin, let us dive into the game itself-- literally.

    picture.php?albumid=41&pictureid=329

    Within this "small" (by the standards when it was first made, at least) pokemon Gold cartridge lies a mess of wires, chips, resisters, etc, and the battery that powers it.

    It's a complex circut, basically!

    When inserted into the game boy, a current is sent out into the game, reading all the information stored on it as the game loads up.

    Physics is why it works. Physics is the reason that the electrical currents move through the game, why the save data is read, and why you can even play it on the gamboy in the first place. End of story. Not a single videogame would work without physics.

    While playing the actual coded game, as well, physics is at work. In some games, logic doesn't seem to be at play- the physics of it doesn't match up. Pokemon games are actually fairly realistic, compared to some other video games. When you jump off the ledge, you fall down. When you throw the pokeball, it doesn't float into the sky- it continues on it's path and hits the pokemon. In some of the newer games, when crossing a log, you can fall off. I may be tired and rambling at this point, but that's because I can. In some games, like Harvest Moon, there is no logic. Crops growing in less than a month? Cows getting pregnent with a potion? Teleporting?

    I dare you to go and play one of your videogames and analize it. Is the physic within it logical, or not? Take some time to take in the world around you- none of it would be there without physics. It's just that important!

    • 2
      entries
    • 4
      comments
    • 3108
      views

    Recent Entries

    Physics is in dodgeball no matter what you may think. There is kinematics along with work and energy. This is almost all in the throw of the dodgeball and how you hard and fast you can throw the dodgeball.

    dodgeball-logo-right.png

    The energy is used for the ball through the air. if you throw the ball it has a certain kinetic energy as it flies towards its target. The energy of this is based on how fast you can get the ball with the initial velocity and the kinetic will remain the same if you neglect air resistance. the work is shown through how much you move your arm and how far the ball has to fly. the ball is displaced and the force you throw with is the amount of work the ball made. there is also kinematics because you can use it to determine the distance that the ball will travel after you release it from your hand.

    this all shows that there is more physics in dodgeball than most people realized. the kinematics will show distance and velocity. the work will show how much was done by the person and the ball through the air. and finally there was energy because that there was kinetic and potential along with internal.

  15. When one plays a guitar, it is so important to remember all the physics behind it. Waves have a lot to do with the sound we hear from them. For example, without a large amplitude, it would not be heard. And when one changes notes, it changes the frequency that is heard. Because the wave is longitudinal, it needs a medium to travel through which is why in a vacuum you would not be able to hear someome playing. The pulses vibrate parallel to the wave because in a longitudinal wave thats their path.

    Also, playing the guitar has a lot to do with mechanical energy as one strums the strings. Without the physical motion of the player, there would be no sound. Overtones are a cool thing string instruments have that have a lot to di with waves, which is another physics point!

    Next time one picks up a guitar remember all the physics behind it!!!

    • 2
      entries
    • 5
      comments
    • 5453
      views

    Recent Entries

    When you throw a football to someone you wont think about physics but physics is happening everywhere. You will make adjustments for everything before you throw the ball. You will make adjustments to your head for factors like how hard you have to throw it or the angle you have to throw it depending on how far away your target is. This is all physics but you dont realize it because you do it naturally in your head.

    Whenever you throw a football there will always be a parabolic path because the movement of the ball in the virticle direction is influenced by gravity. As a football travels up, gravity will slow it down until it reaches its peak, then it will stop briefly at that peak. Then the ball will start its acceleration back to the ground because of gravity. This path the football takes is called its projectile motion and here is a picture of what it looks like.

    20092281136226337141778225000003208.jpg

    Some equations you can use for situations like this are

    vf=vi+at

    d=vit+1/2at^2

    vf^2=vi^2+2ad

    Ay=Asin0

    Ax=Acos0

  16. Physics?

    • 2
      entries
    • 3
      comments
    • 1797
      views

    Recent Entries

    willpaggs
    Latest Entry

    We use cell phones everyday. We look at our phones constantly. Iphone users look at their phones 3x more than normal phone users.

    The cell phone uses circuits to power it. It uses waves from cell towers so we're able to call and send messages and stuff. The screen gives off light waves which is what we see when we look at our screens.

    We take advantage of technology. We use things without thinking. We learn how to do things fast, but we don't really know how it all works,

    • 1
      entry
    • 4
      comments
    • 1518
      views

    Recent Entries

    Like some others, I personally cannot sleep unless it is completely dark in my bedroom. However with the placement of my bed in a dark area of my room, I'm surprised to find that I cannot sleep because there is still light shining on my bed. But why is there still light if the window in my bedroom is behind my bed, next to a wall? Shouldn't the light be blocked by the barrier? No! The light from the window still shines on to my bed, despite the wall barrier and placement of the bed and window, because there is a diffraction of the light waves.

    Diffraction occurs when light waves move past the edge of the barrier, bending the stream of light to another area. In my case, the light from my window was diffracting out past the wall barrier and around to the area where my bed is placed. The amount of diffraction of a light wave depends on both the wavelength of the wave and the size of the space the wave is traveling around. Because the wavelength of the light is constant and it is moving around a large space in my room, there is little diffraction.

    Based on my research on diffraction, there is not much I can do about lessening the light shining onto my bed in my bedroom. Even if I were to make the space that the light waves pass through smaller, diffraction would still occur. However, I did learn what causes diffraction and what effects the amount it gives off. It seems that my only solution is to get some very good, very strong curtains! :lol:

  17. As summer gets closer, the weather gets warmer and everyone itches to get outside. One of my personal favorite things to do on those hot summer days is to go swimming! So many people enjoy it and it is something that they do all the time, but the majority of people don't stop to think about all of the physics that is involved in it. And there is a lot!

    First, the most obvious is the difference in gravity. When you are just walking around normally, you stay on the ground. You never begin to float towards the sky because of the force of gravity on earth. The force of gravity is 9.81m/s^2. However, as you may know, when you are in a pool or the ocean it is very hard to stay on the ground because there is nothing pulling you down. But you are still on the earth... so how can that be possible? Although the force of gravity is the same, there is an additional force acting in the water called buoyancy. This means that when an object is put in water, it will displace the amount of water equal to its volume. This is why objects appear to be lighter when they are in water.

    There is also a lot of resistance in water. Water is about 1000 times more resistant than air and about 91% of a persons energy is lost through drag. Therefore, when swimming competitively, swimmers need to maximize their streamline. They can do this by wearing swim caps. As you can see, there is a lot of physics in swimming. So next time you jump in the pool, think about all of the physics that is going on! Thanks for reading :)

    • 2
      entries
    • 1
      comment
    • 1498
      views

    Recent Entries

    Butterflies in your stomach and adrenaline rushing through your veins, roller coasters are an extremely thrilling experience to the riders. While on them, have you ever thought about how they really work and why?

    Roller coasters actually operate similarly to catapults and in some cases they actually use catapult launches. These systems operate by very quickly building kinetic energy and exerting it to the train. An example of this system is called the linear-induction motor. This system uses electromagnets to create two magnetic fields that attract. Overall it's a good system because it creates precision, control, speed, and durability.

    Of course with such an efficient operating system, the train needs a good way to stop and let the passengers off. To create the maximum break efficiency, the breaks are instead built into the track instead of on the train itself. There are clamps connected to hydraulic systems, so in case of emergency the clamps tense and friction slows down the trains movements.

    When actually on the ride, you are part of the energy of the whole system. The ride stores massive amounts of potential energy when ascending up the hills. At the highest point, the train has the most gravitational force possible. After the peak, the train releases the potential energy and becomes kinetic energy.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...