Question - Answer
Q.No.
1. State the universal law of gravitation.
Answer:
The
statement of universal law of gravitation is as follows.
“Every
object in the universe attracts every other object with a force which is directly
proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the
square of the distance between them”.
Q.No.
2. Write the formula to find the magnitude of the gravitational force between
the earth and object on the surface of the earth.
Answers:
The
formula which is used to find the magnitude of the gravitational force between
the earth and object on the surface of the earth is given below.
F = GMm/d²
Here,
F
denotes gravitational force.
M
and m denote mass of the earth and object respectively.
d
denotes distance between the earth and the object.
G
is the universal gravitational constant.
The
value of G is 6.673x10-11 Nm2/kg2.
Q.No.
3. What do you mean by free fall?
Answer:
When an object falls towards
the earth. There is no change in the direction of the motion of the object. But
due to the earth’s attraction, there will be a change in the magnitude of the
velocity.Therefore, whenever an object falls towards the earth, an acceleration
is involved due to the earth’s gravitational force.
This acceleration is called
acceleration due to the gravitational force of the earth or acceleration due to
gravity. It is denoted by g. The SI unit of g is ms-2.
According to universal law of
gravitation, we know that
F = GMm/d² ................. (i)
F = mg ................. (ii)
F = GMm/d² ................. (i)
F = mg ................. (ii)
Now,
from (i) and (ii)
mg
=
Therefore,
g
= GM/d²
Q.No. 4. What do you mean by acceleration due to gravity?
Answer:
Whenever an object falls
towards to the earth, acceleration is involved due to gravitational force. This
is called acceleration due to gravity. This is equal to
g
= GM/d²
Here,
G
is the gravitational constant and equal to 6.673x10-11 Nm2/kg2.
M
is the mass of the earth.
Q.No. 5. What are the difference between the mass of an object and its weight?
Answer:
The mass of an object is the
measure of inertia. The mass of an object is constant. It does not change from
place to place. Therefore, the mass of an object remains same whether on the
surface of the earth, moon or outer space.
The weight of an object is
variable. It changes from place to place because it depends on gravitational
force. Therefore, weight of an object is not same whether on the surface of the
earth, moon and outer space.
Q.No. 6. Why is the weight of an object on the moon 1/6th its weight of
the earth.
Answer:
Let the acceleration due to
gravity on the surface of the earth is g and mass is m.
The
weight of the object on the surface of the earth = we = mg
The
weight of the object on the surface of the moon = wm =mg/6
We
know that acceleration due to gravity on the surface of the moon is 1/6th
of earth.
Therefore,
wm
=we/6
Therefore,
the weight of an object on the moon is 1/6th its weight of the earth.