AST 101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Gravitational Energy, Net Force

• School: Stony Brook University
• Department: Astronomy
• Course: AST 101
• Professor: Jin Koda

Document Summary

Making sense of the universe: understanding motion, energy, & gravity. Velocity - speed and direction of an object. All falling objects accelerate at the same rate. Speed increases 10m/s for every second that it is falling. Mass - the amount of matter in an object. Weight - the force that acts upon an object. Never changes even if on another planet. In space a gas cloud has more gravitational energy when spread out than when. Mass itself is a form of potential energy. Related to temperature but it is not the same. Temp is average kinetic energy in a substance. Thermal energy is total kinetic energy in a substance. Caused by many particles hitting a wall. Total momentum of the particles that hit a wall. When squeezed, higher pressure, faster motion of gas particles, hotter. During a star formation gravity squeezes gas and star becomes hotter. Gravitational potential energy is converted to heat (thermal energy)