When you keep your pencil box on your table, does that move? No, it doesn’t rather it’s just in its ‘stationary state’. But ever thought that even in its stationary state the box is exerting a type of gravitational force towards the earth. This is a real-life example of Newtons first law of motion. Thinking hard? Don’t have to as Physics has the answer to it, we will walk you through easy ways to understand Newton’s laws of motion.
What is Force?
Force is a vector quantity that can be described as a physical cause that changes or tend to change the state of motion or the state of rest of an object.
Force can be measured in units called Newtons(N), named after the famous scientist Sir Isaac Newton.
Let us now understand few applications of Newton’s laws of Motion.
If a body is in a state of rest, it will remain in the state of rest and if it is in the state of motion, it will continue moving in the same direction with the same speed unless an external force is applied on it. This is known as Newton’s first law of motion and also called ‘Law of Inertia’.
A ball rolling on a horizontal surface keeps on running unless an external force stops it. Similarly, a book kept on a table remains placed at its place unless it is displaced.
Newton’s second law of motion
The rate of change of momentum of a body is directly proportional to the force applied on it and the change in momentum is in the direction in which force is applied.
The application of the second law is always witnessed when we try to make an object move like stopping a moving ball rolling on the floor or pushing a ball to make it move.
The force can be derived as:
F= Kma (F= force, K= Constant, M= Mass, A= acceleration)
K=1
F=ma
Often in cricket matches, you have seen the cricketers catching the ball, sportsmen swing their hands backward as they catch the ball as it provides the ball more time to lose its speed, thereby the second law of motion comes in place.
Newton’s third law of motion
To every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.
When you exert a force(action) on a wall by pushing the palm of your hands against it you experience a force(reaction) exerted by the wall on your palm.
It’s difficult for you to walk on a slippery surface but it’s easy to walk on a rough surface. This is because the horizontal component of the force you exert on the floor for pushing it backwards gets a reaction force from the rough ground as what we often refer as friction, but slippery surface lacks this friction.
These were a few basic real-life application of Newton’s law of motion. For more information stay updated with BYJU’S.
