Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Distance
Distance traveled during a time interval is the total path length the object moved during such interval, which is a scalar, denoted by .
Displacement
The displacement during a time interval is the change of position of an object during such interval, which is a vector, denoted by x .
Speed
(I) Average Speed
The average speed is the average rate of move of an object, defined by the distance traveled over the time interval
Savg
(2.1)
S lim
t 0
d dt
(2.2)
Velocity
(I) Average Velocity
The average velocity is the average rate of change in position of an object, defined by the displacement of the time interval
Vavg
x t
(2.3)
V lim
t 0
x dx t dt
(2.4)
Note
Since the object can not turn direction in an infinitesimal time interval, that is, the instantaneous speed is just the magnitude of instantaneous velocity
Acceleration
(I) Average Acceleration
The average acceleration is the average rate of change in velocity of an object, defined by the change in velocity during the time interval
aavg
v t
(2.5)
a lim
t 0
v dv d 2 x t dt dt 2
(2.6)
vavg
v v0 2
(2.7)
From the two equations above, setting the reference time to be zero, we have v v0 at
Replace the Vavg and V in the second equation above by Eq.(2.3) and Eq.(2.7) with respectively, we have
1 x x0 v0t at 2 2
Now express t by Eq.(2.7) and substitute it into Eq.(2.9), then we have
v 2 v02 2a ( x x0 )
(2.8)
(2.9)
gravitation acceleration g=9.8 m/s, usually we choose upward as positive direction, hence the acceleration in freely falling object will be g, and the equations for constant acceleration motion are listed below
v y v0 y gt
y y0
v y v0 y 2
1 y y0 v0 y t gt 2 2
2 v2 y v0 y 2 g ( y y 0 )
x0
dx vdt
t0
Where x and x0 is the position corresponding to the time t and t0, and from calculus, we have the mean value of velocity can be given by 1 t 1 t vavg vdt vdt t t0 t0 t t0 Finally, we have
x x0 vavg t
(2.10)
(2.11)