Units
People in Physics
Forces
Motion
Temperature & Heat
Electricity
Magnets & Light
Radioactivity
100
The unit of force.
What are newtons?
100
He discovered the three laws of motion, co-developed calculus, and wrote the Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica.
Who is Isaac Newton?
100
"Every object continues in a state of rest or unchanging speed and direction unless acted upon by a nonzero net force".
What is Newton's 1st Law? (Or, what is inertia?)
100
The formula for this is distance/time.
What is speed (or velocity)?
100
The average kinetic energy of the molecules and atoms in a substance.
What is temperature?
100
The potential for potential energy.
What is voltage?
100
An electromagnetic wave.
What is light?
100
This type of nuclear radiation is the nucleus of a helium atom.
What is an alpha particle?
200
The unit of energy.
What are Joules?
200
This hugely influential Greek philosopher believed that objects moved `according to their nature'.
Who is Aristotle?
200
What is 50 newtons?
200
It has both magnitude and direction.
What is a vector?
200
The transfer of energy due to a difference in temperature.
What is heat?
200
The type of current produced by a battery.
What is direct current?
200
The name for a particle of light.
What is a photon?
200
This type of radiation is the most penetrative, and takes several meters of concrete to block.
What is gamma radiation?
300
The unit of electric current.
What are amperes?
300
Using direct experiment, he showed that all objects fall at the sate rate, and that an object in motion stays in motion unless acted upon by a force.
Who is Galileo Galilei?
300
The force perpendicular to the surface something rests on (the force that keeps a book from falling through the table).
What is the normal (or support) force?
300
The change in direction or speed.
What is acceleration?
300
The temperature scale that defines the boiling point of water as 100 degrees.
What is the Celsius scale?
300
A material through which charge flows easily.
What is an electrical conductor?
300
A charged object must do this to create a magnetic field.
What is travel/move/have a nonzero velocity?
300
The nuclear force that is very, very short-ranged.
What is the strong nuclear force?
400
The unit of the rate of energy per second (power).
What is a watt?
400
This person discovered special relativity, which explains why magnetic fields exist.
Who is Albert Einstein?
400
A common term for the force of gravity, which changes depending on what planet you are on.
What is weight?
400
The more of this something has, the harder it is to accelerate it.
What is (inertial) mass?
400
The theoretical temperature of a gas molecule with no kinetic energy.
What is zero kelvin?
400
The source of electrons in a circuit.
What is a wire?
400
The type of magnet that is always strongly attracted to magnetic fields.
What is a ferromagnet?
400
This type of decay produces neutrinos.
What is beta decay?
500
The unit for "little g".
What is meters per second per second (m/s2)?
500
This medieval scientist studied light, wrote The Book of Optics, and pioneered the scientific method about 500 years before Newton or Galileo.
Who is Ibn al-Haytham?
500
An object is pushed at constant velocity with 20 N of force. This is the amount of frictional force opposing its motion.
What is 20 N?
500
The direction of centripetal force during circular motion.
What is toward the center?
500
This substance has a very high heat capacity, which makes life on Earth possible.
What is (liquid) water?
500
This important electrical component reduces the current in a circuit, without changing the overall voltage.
What is a resistor?
500
This type of light has the least amount of energy per photon.
What is a radio wave?
500
This force can change neutrons into protons (and protons into neutrons).
What is the weak nuclear force?
600
The unit of charge.
What is a coulomb?
600
He developed and popularized alternating current.
Who is Nikola Tesla?
600
The term for rotational force.
What is torque?
600
This causes a hoop to roll down a hill more slowly than a cylinder.
What is rotational inertia?
600
The transfer of heat by lightwaves.
What is radiation?
600
The kilowatt-hour is a unit of this.
What is energy?
600
These three colors correspond to the vibrational frequencies of the three cones in our eyes.
What are red, green, and blue?
600
This nuclear radiation detector can be made at home using dry ice (and a few other things).
What is a cloud chamber?
700
The unit of electric resistance.
What are Ohms? (What is
Omega)?
700
He developed an important (though somewhat incorrect) quantum mechanical model of the atom.
Who is Niels Bohr?
700
A frame of reference in which everything is moving at the same relative speed (not accelerating).
What is an inertial reference frame?
700
The conservation of this causes a spinning ice skater to speed up when they pull their arms in.
What is rotational momentum?
700
The transfer of heat via fluid motion.
What is convection?
700
The amount of current through these lightbulbs.
What is 1 Amp?
700
The speed at which microwaves travel through space.
What is the speed of light, 3 x 108 m/s?
700
A 10 gram radioactive sample has a half-life of 10 minutes. This is how much is left after 20 minutes.
What is 2.5 grams?
800
The unit of magnetic fields.
What is a tesla?
800
This experimentalist published a huge number of discoveries about electricity and magnetism--including the idea of a field--all without knowing much mathematics.
Who is Michael Faraday?
800
During freefall, the air resistance on an object must be equal to this.
What is the force of gravity?
800
This type of velocity is the same for everyone on a spinning merry-go-round.
What is rotational velocity?
800
The reason that bridges need expansion joints.
What is thermal expansion?
800
This device "steps up" or "steps down" voltage, making it possible to transport AC electricity across long distances.
What is a transformer?
800
A current-carrying solenoid.
What is an electromagnet?
800
The main source of radiation exposure for most people in the world.
What is natural background radiation (rocks, minerals, radon, cosmic rays, etc).