The document provides definitions and explanations of fundamental physics concepts, including scalar and vector quantities, motion, forces, energy, waves, light, and electricity. Key terms such as mass, velocity, acceleration, pressure, and resistance are defined, along with descriptions of various phenomena like oscillation, thermal energy, and electric fields. It serves as a comprehensive reference for understanding basic principles of physics.
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Physics Definitions
The document provides definitions and explanations of fundamental physics concepts, including scalar and vector quantities, motion, forces, energy, waves, light, and electricity. Key terms such as mass, velocity, acceleration, pressure, and resistance are defined, along with descriptions of various phenomena like oscillation, thermal energy, and electric fields. It serves as a comprehensive reference for understanding basic principles of physics.
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Physics De nition
1) Scalar quantities: Quantities with magnitude only
2) Vector quantities: Quantities with magnitude and direction 3) Distance: The number of units moved by an object from one place to another 4) Mass: The measure of the quantity of matter in an object(kg) 5) Speed: Distance travelled per unit time 6) Velocity: Speed with a direction 7) Acceleration: Rate of change of velocity 8) Acceleration of free fall: 9) Oscillation: Oscillation is going back and forth repeatedly between two positions or states. 10) Volume: The quantity of space and object takes up(cm3) 11) Density: The total mass of an object by its volume (kg/cm3) 12) Force: Push or pull exerted by one object on another(Newtons) 13) Terminal Velocity: Terminal velocity is de ned as the highest velocity attained by an object falling 14) Inertia: Inertia is the natural tendency of objects in motion to stay in motion and objects at rest to stay at rest, unless a force causes its velocity to change. 15) Static Friction: force that keeps an object at rest. 16) Dynamic Friction: friction that opposes the movement of a body which is already in motion 17) Drag:force exerted by a uid stream on any obstacle in its path or felt by an object moving through a uid 18) Gravitational force: pull from earths surface 19) Weight: Earths gravitational force on an object 20) Gravitational eld: Region in which a mass experiences a force due to gravitational attraction 21) Momentum:the product of an object's mass and velocity 22) Impulse: The sudden force acting on an object for a short interval of time 23) Centripetal force: the force on an object on a circular path that keeps the object moving on the path. 24) Centrifugal Force:the outward force, away from the axis of rotation, acting on a revolving object. 25) Moment: Turning e ect of a force, aka torque 26) Centre of gravity:the point within an object where its weight is evenly balanced in all directions. 27) Load: Force applied to a spring 28) Extension: di erence between the stretched and un stretched length 29) Limit to proportionality: the point at which the extension is still proportional to load 30) Elastic limit: The point beyond which the spring is left permanently stretched 31) Pressure: the amount of force exerted per area 32) Energy: the ability to do work, which is the ability to exert a force causing displacement of an object 33) Work done: the amount of energy transferred to an object by an external Force when it is moved over a certain distance by that Force 34) Kinetic energy:the energy an object has because of its motion 35) Potential energy:stored energy that depends upon the relative position of various parts of a system 36) E ciency:a comparison of the energy output to the energy input in a given system. 37) Power:the rate of doing work 38) Internal energy: Total kinetic and potential energies of all those atoms or molecules in a material 39) Heat: energy transferred is known as heat 40) Thermal energy: the energy contained within a system that is responsible for its temperature. 41) Temperature scale: Range of numbers measuring the level of hotness 42) Absolute zero: Lowest temperature there is (-273 degrees C) 43) Convection current : as a natural process of heat transfer involving the movement of energy and heat from one place to another 44) Speci c heat capacity: The energy that must be transferred to an abject to increase its temperature 45) Latent Heat capacity: The energy required to change the state of an object ffi fi fl ff fi ff fi fl fi 46) Thermal capacity:the quantity of heat necessary to produce a unit change of temperature in a unit mass of a material. 47) Transverse waves: Waves which move perpendicular to the direction of travel or energy transfer. The waves oscillation go from up to down. 48) Longitudinal Waves: Waves move parallel to the direction of travel or energy transfer . Wave oscillations go from side to side 49) Compressions: a region in a longitudinal wave where the particles are closest together. 50) Rarefactions:a region in a longitudinal wave where the particles are furthest apart. 51) Wavelength: The distance between any point on a wave and an equivalent point on the next wave 52) Frequency: The number of waves passing by any point per second 53) Amplitude: The maximum distance a point moves from its rest position when a wave passes 54) Re ection:Re ection is when light bounces o an object 55) Rarefaction: When waves change direction and speed due to a change in medium its called rarefaction. 56) Di raction: Waves bend round the sides of an obstacle, or spread out as they pass through a gap. 57) Sound Waves:the pattern of disturbance caused by the movement of energy traveling through a medium (such as air, water or any other liquid or solid matter) as it propagates away from the source of the sound. 58) Echoes:A repeated sound that is caused by the re ection of sound waves from a surface 59) Pitch:the measure of sound frequency expressed in terms of Hertz. Higher the frequency, higher the pitch 60) Ultrasound: A sound above 20000 Hz 61) Luminous: objects which emit their own light 62) Non luminous: Objects which re ect light 63) Monochromatic light: Light of a single wavelength and colour 64) Laterally inverted:the apparent reversal of the mirror image's left and right when compared with the object 65) Real Images: as the images formed due to the convergence of light rays after being re ected or refracted from a mirror, lens, or object. In other words, a real image is formed in front of the mirror 66) Virtual images: an upright image that is achieved where the rays seem to diverge., formed on same side as object 67) Refractive index: The ratio of the speed of light in a vacuum to its speed in a speci c medium. 68) Deviated: When the light bends through a prism and comes out in another direction 69) Spectrum: When a beam of white lights splits into a range of colours 70) Dispersion: E ect of rays being split into a range of colours 71) Total internal re ection: complete re ection of a ray of light within a medium such as water or glass from the surrounding surfaces back into the medium 72) Critical angle: The angle beyond which total internal re ection takes place. 73) Convex lens:a lens that converges rays of light that convey parallel to its principal axis 74) Concave lens:a lens that diverges a straight light beam from the source to a diminished, upright, virtual image 75) Principal focus:Principal focus is a point (on the principal axis) where parallel incident rays meet after re ecting (in mirrors) or refracting (in lenses). The point at which all rays converge and meet 76) Focal length:he distance between a lens and its focal point, while the focal point is the point at which parallel light rays converge or diverge 77) Concave lens: a lens that diverges a straight light beam from the source to a diminished, upright, virtual image. 78) Diverging lens:a lens that diverges a straight light beam from the source to a diminished, upright, virtual image. 79) Focal plane:a plane that is perpendicular to the axis of a lens or mirror and passes through the focus. 80) Conductors:the materials or substances which allow electricity to ow through them 81) Insulators: Materials that do not allow electricity to pass through them 82) Semiconductors:materials which have a conductivity between conductors (generally metals) and nonconductors or insulators ff fl fl ff fl fl fl fl ff fl fl fl fi fl 83) Earthed:the process in which the instantaneous discharge of the electrical energy takes place by transferring charges directly to the earth through low resistance wire. 84) Induced charges:When the electrons move out of an area, they leave an unbalanced positive charge due to the nuclei. This results in a region of negative charge on the object nearest to the external charge, and a region of positive charge on the part away from it. These are called induced charges. 85) Electric eld: an invisible force eld created by the attraction and repulsion of electrical charges 86) Ions: a chemical species which holds a positive or negative charge of some magnitude 87) Cell:A cell is a single electrical energy source that uses chemical reactions to produce a current. Provides the push needed for currents to ow 88) Current:the rate at which electrons ow past a point in a complete electrical circuit 89) Potential Di erence:the di erence in the amount of energy that charge carriers have between two points in a circuit 90) Electromotive force: Maximum potential di erence across cell 91) Series circuit: one in which all circuit elements are arranged in a single path 92) Parallel circuit:an electrical path that branches so that the current divides and only part of it ows through any branch 93) Resistance: the opposition that a substance o ers to the ow of electric current 94) Resistivity: a property that describes the extent to which a material opposes the ow of electric current through it 95) Power: rate at which energy is transferred fl fi ff ff fi fl ff ff fl fl fl