Concept
Acceleration
Related concepts (34)
Newton's laws of motion
Newton's laws of motion are three basic laws of classical mechanics that describe the relationship between the motion of an object and the forces acting on it. These laws can be paraphrased as follows: A body remains at rest, or in motion at a constant speed in a straight line, unless acted upon by a force. When a body is acted upon by a force, the time rate of change of its momentum equals the force. If two bodies exert forces on each other, these forces have the same magnitude but opposite directions.
Gravity
In physics, gravity () is a fundamental interaction which causes mutual attraction between all things that have mass. Gravity is, by far, the weakest of the four fundamental interactions, approximately 1038 times weaker than the strong interaction, 1036 times weaker than the electromagnetic force and 1029 times weaker than the weak interaction. As a result, it has no significant influence at the level of subatomic particles.
Force
In physics, a force is an influence that can cause an object to change its velocity, i.e., to accelerate, unless counterbalanced by other forces. The concept of force makes the everyday notion of pushing or pulling mathematically precise. Because the magnitude and direction of a force are both important, force is a vector quantity. It is measured in the SI unit of newton (N) and often represented by the symbol F.
General relativity
General relativity, also known as the general theory of relativity and Einstein's theory of gravity, is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1915 and is the current description of gravitation in modern physics. General relativity generalizes special relativity and refines Newton's law of universal gravitation, providing a unified description of gravity as a geometric property of space and time or four-dimensional spacetime.
Mass
Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a physical body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different elementary particles, theoretically with the same amount of matter, have nonetheless different masses. Mass in modern physics has multiple definitions which are conceptually distinct, but physically equivalent.
Classical mechanics
Classical mechanics is a physical theory describing the motion of macroscopic objects, from projectiles to parts of machinery and astronomical objects, such as spacecraft, planets, stars, and galaxies. For objects governed by classical mechanics, if the present state is known, it is possible to predict how it will move in the future (determinism), and how it has moved in the past (reversibility). The "classical" in "classical mechanics" does not refer classical antiquity, as it might in, say, classical architecture.
Special relativity
In physics, the special theory of relativity, or special relativity for short, is a scientific theory of the relationship between space and time. In Albert Einstein's 1905 treatment, the theory is based on two postulates: The laws of physics are invariant (identical) in all inertial frames of reference (that is, frames of reference with no acceleration). The speed of light in vacuum is the same for all observers, regardless of the motion of light source or observer.
Inertial frame of reference
In classical physics and special relativity, an inertial frame of reference (also called inertial space, or Galilean reference frame) is a frame of reference not undergoing any acceleration. It is a frame in which an isolated physical object—an object with zero net force acting on it—is perceived to move with a constant velocity or, equivalently, it is a frame of reference in which Newton's first law of motion holds.
Speed of light
The speed of light in vacuum, commonly denoted c, is a universal physical constant that is exactly equal to ). According to the special theory of relativity, c is the upper limit for the speed at which conventional matter or energy (and thus any signal carrying information) can travel through space. All forms of electromagnetic radiation, including visible light, travel at the speed of light. For many practical purposes, light and other electromagnetic waves will appear to propagate instantaneously, but for long distances and very sensitive measurements, their finite speed has noticeable effects.
Euclidean vector
In mathematics, physics, and engineering, a Euclidean vector or simply a vector (sometimes called a geometric vector or spatial vector) is a geometric object that has magnitude (or length) and direction. Vectors can be added to other vectors according to vector algebra. A Euclidean vector is frequently represented by a directed line segment, or graphically as an arrow connecting an initial point A with a terminal point B, and denoted by . A vector is what is needed to "carry" the point A to the point B; the Latin word vector means "carrier".