Collisions Definition and 709 Threads

Homework Statement A ball is dropped straight down onto a wedge that is sitting on top of a frictionless surface. The wedge is at an angle of 45degreees and has a mass of 5.00kg. The ball has a mass of 3.00kg. If the ball collides with the wedge at 4.50m/s, and the collision is instantaneous...

Hi, I'm trying to make a 2d simulation of elastic colliding balls. I have a hard time deriving the motion equations after collision. For each ball i know the speed, the mass and the angle of movement. Can anyone point me in the right direction to find the general equations for this ? I need the...

Homework Statement Three carts of masses 4.0 kg, 10 kg, and 3.0 kg move on a frictionless horizontal track with speeds of 5.0 m/s, 3.0 m/s, and -4.0 m/s, as shown in Figure P6.34. The carts stick together after colliding. Does your answer require that all carts collide and stick together at...

Homework Statement A block of mass M is compressed a distance x against a spring which has a spring constant k. When released, the block slides along a frictionless surface until it undergoes a completely inelastic collision with a block of mass 3M. The two blocks travel together some distance...

Homework Statement I am to find the mean time between collisions of electrons in a wire and am having a difficult time manipulating equations with known variables. I am given values for E, J, n and rowe. Homework Equations v = (qT/m)*E rowe = E/J J = nqv The Attempt at a Solution...

Two trucks, one twice as heavy as the other, collide head on (assume it's one dimensional and easy ;) ) and the collission is perfectly inelastic. If it was perfectly inelastic there would be no kinetic energy left, and therefore no velocity. How do the trucks manage to conserve momentum by...

assuming collisions are elastic... right 5 equal masses, if you displace the first ball then you observe balls 2-4 stationary and 5 moves off with equal speed to the right, as all the momentum and energy is passed to ball 2, ball 1 stops, ball 2 then passes all its momentum and energy to ball...

Hello. I am trying to better understand relativistic inelastic collisions for objects with mass and the setup for them. Let's say that I have two objects with different masses, one of which collides with the other, which is stationary. Without even specifying a reference frame, can I solve...

I am aware that the LHC accelerates subatomic particles to just under the speed of light then smashes them together. However, at the time of collision, would this mean that the combined speed of the impacting particles is almost two times the speed of light? Or are the particles individually...

A few questions... 1) Does an electron have to have the exact amount of energy to cause excitation, or can it have more (i.e. can the eV of an incoming electron be equal or more than the excitation energy required for excitation of an atom to happen)? If so, does the electron that collided...

Why when a boxer, mma artist, football player, or any other athlete makes a collision such as a punch, kick or tackle we measure that using Force units (pounds or kilograms)? Would not make more sense use Energy units or Impulse units? I was just watching espn and they say a football...

Hello, I was thinking about colliding balls and the conservation of momentum. If a ball weighing 10kg traveling at 10m/s collides with another stationary ball weighing 5kg, then the two balls should be moving with some velocity so that the overall momentum is 100kg m/s My question is what...

About collisions of macroscopic objects: - Can they be perfectly elastic in reality? If not is this a consequence of the 2nd thermodynamic law? About microscopic collisions (between molecules, atoms or elementary particles) - Can they be perfectly elastic? A collision between two...

I'm doing a research project on collisions and I've come across a part of my theory that requires solutions to coupled damped oscillators. Could anyone please refer me to some text on 2 coupled damped oscillators which isn't extremely math heavy and has conceptual explanations of the...

Does it exist an accurate model about what happen when two stellar bodies collide?. I'm referring to the kind of collision between neutron stars, white dwarfs. I was wondering if that collision could produce a new kind of object. For example: a white dwarf into a neutron star, and a neutron star...

Can we use energy in LHC collisions?

Homework Statement A particle of rest mass m_1 moving with velocity u_1 along the x-axis collides with a stationary particle of rest mass m_2 stationary along the x-axis. If subsequently the particle with rest mass m_1 moves in the direction making an angle of 60^{o} relative to the x-axis...

Homework Statement Derive formula for elastic collisions in one dimension, unequal masses target at rest. i am having trouble acquiring the same formula that the book gives me, please tell me where my algebra is incorrect... i need to be able to derive these formulas properly because...

1) A tennis ball of mass mt is held just above a basketball of mass mb. Their centers are vertically aligned. They fall through a height h, then there's an elastic collision with the ground which reverses the velcoity of the basketball while the tennis ball is still moving down because the...

Hi - I got into a debate with a friend of mine today and was wondering if you could shed some light on this topic. Two identical cars are moving at, say, 30 mph and hit head-on. There is some force and momentum involved there... Would they hit with the same force and/or momentum as an...

Homework Statement There are 3 blocks, A B and C, arranged left to right. blocks A and C have masses of m and block B has mass of 2m. block A heads toward the other two with velocity v. determine the final velocity of each block after all subsequent collisions. assume all collisions are...

In a particle accelerator I.e. LHC a beam of protons are moving past each other and produce an est 1billion collisions per sec. Here's a question about that and the result of such collisions. please bear with me as this may seem a simple question. how do we know exactly that the results recorded...

I want to know the ways newly created particles are detected during collisions such as in LHC or Fermilab, i.e either they check the EM force, electric charge being observed or other things...

Hello everyone, Quick question: Which particles are colliding at the LHC and why? All I know is that proton-proton collisions are explored as well as heavier nuclei such as gold (Au) and lead (Pb) to research the quark-gluon plasma state. -Hioj

Hello - I am pretty sure this is correct but there is no answer for me to check. My friend (who is a lot smarter than me :P ) got a different answer entirely. Is the following answers correct? Homework Statement Puck A has a mass of 0.0300 kg and is moving along the x-axis with a velocity of...

If one observer in an inertial reference measures a collision to be elastic, then all observers in an inertial reference frame will measure the collision to be elastic - can this be explained with the conservation of energy? What exactly does the conservation of energy principle say in regards...

How will the space vehicles avoid satellites and those kind of things, when they are on a journey? I haven't seen any shuttle hitting a satellite/ even satellite(not geostationary) colliding on each other? What's the reason of it not happening?

My friend is programming a curling application for the Android. He needs a way of calculating the results of perfectly elastic collisions in 2 dimensions with perfectly round objects (curling stones in this case, naturally). I know what the basic formula for the conservation of momentum is for...

First off, I'm not in any way anti-LHC. Quite the opposite to be honest. Even so, this speculative disaster scenario (vacuum bubbles) have caught my attention latelly, and I haven't been able to let go off it. Mostly because I find the otherwise brilliant LSAG-report (both actually) to be quite...

Homework Statement http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/8045/questuinfunny.jpg The Attempt at a Solution [PLAIN][PLAIN]http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/3619/funnyquestion.jpg

Homework Statement A radioactive nucleus at rest decays into a second nucleus, an electron and a neutrino.The electron and neutrino are emitted at right angles and have momenta of 9.3x10^23kg*m/s and 5.40x10^23kg*m/s, respectively. What are the magnitude and direction of the momentum of the...

Homework Statement Billiard ball A of mass mA= 0.400kg moving with speed vA=1.80m/s strikes ball B initially at erst, of mass mB=0.500kg.As a result of the collision,ball A is deflected off at an angle of 30.0degrees with a speed v'A=1.10m/s. Taking the x-axis as the original direction of...

The science series currently on TV in the US called WORMSHOLES, narrated by Morgan Freeman (the actor) has a number of recent some new ideas. (Very worthwhile series, by the way.) The show last night discussed dark matter and dark energy and referred to a distant pair of galaxies colliding...

Homework Statement Daisy (65.0kg) skates on ice at 4.5m/s to greet her friend (75.0kg), who is standing still, with open arms. As they collide, while holding each other, with what speed do the both move off together? Homework Equations MaVa+MbVb / Ma+Mb The Attempt at a Solution...

how fast are the particles in the 2 beams of a Pulsar traveling? and what happens when two of those beams intersect? do those particles collide at extremely high velocities like in particle accelerators?

Hi, I'm helping my friend with a space combat game he is programming. What I'm trying to figure out is how to model the collisions between spheres in 3D. So far I've figured out how to calculate final velocities of 2 colliding spheres using conservation of linear momentum. I found a...

Ok so I'm writing a 3D game that uses impulse to determine how things behave when they collide. In this game I have two cubes. Now the shape of each cube is defined by 9 spheres, sort of like this: http://mark.reid.name/images/figures/high-dim-3d.png Though in my game the middle sphere is...

Homework Statement Consider an elastic collision of two particles in the centre of mass frame. Briefly explain why the speed of EACH particle after the collision is the same as before the collision. (FYI this is exam revision so it isn't worth any marks) The Attempt at a Solution...

Homework Statement Which of the following statements is true for collisions? a) Momentum and Kinetic energy are always conserved in collisions. b) Momentum can only conserved in elastic collisions. c) Kinetic energy is conserved only in inelastic collisions. d) Only kinetic energy can be...

Homework Statement Two blocks are on a frictionless ramp. The first block has a mass of 5.00kg and is released from the top of the ramp 5.00m. It has a magnet on the front with the north pole facing out. The second block is at rest at the bottom of the ramp and has a mass of 10.00kg. The...

Hi, Would anyone be able to explain the main differences between the effect of electrons and photons colliding with atoms in the ground state. As far as I understand they are very similar as both cause excitation and in some cases ionization. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Dave

Homework Statement A 3 kg steel ball strikes a wall with a speed of 10 m/s at an angle of 60° with the surface. It bounces off with the same speed and angle. If the ball is in contact with the wall for 0.2 s, what is the average force exerted by the wall on the ball...

I am unaware of any other method for analyzing elastic collisions other than applying both conservation of momentum and conservation of energy. Since Newton didn't have conservation of kinetic energy to use as a tool was he unable to analyze elastic collisions? PS In the Scholium at the end...

Homework Statement A nuclear reactor (see below) contains nuclei that fission when bombarded by slow neutrons. The fission reaction produces fast neutrons which need to be moderated (i.e. slowed down) in collisions before they can cause further fissions. In this problem we consider a reactor...

Homework Statement Consider the following reaction that is possible when a proton (p+) collides with a photon (γ): p+ + γ → ∆+. Suppose that the photon is a cosmic microwave-background (CMB) photon of energy 2.3 × 10−4eV. Calculate the minimum energy that the proton must have for this...

A particle accelerator collides 5000 GeV muon+ with 5000 GeV muon- particles, producing two massive particles in the final state, one with a mass of 800 GeV and another particle with unknown mass m. a) write down the initial and final state momentum vectors b) by using the conservation of...

If positive charged particles curve in the presence of a magnetic field does that mean the particles colliding in ATLAS create magnetic fields? I ask this because some of the detected particles curve perpendicular to the collision in ATLAS. From what I observed the trajectory maintains a...

Hi, I am in the process of doing up a physics simulation in 2D OpenGL where balls bounce around the place, colliding with planes and themselves. I have everything done except the collisions between the balls themselves. I can detect a collision but I am finding it hard to find any sort of...

Homework Statement How do you show that in the non-relativistic case, if KE is conserved in a collision as viewed in one frame, then it is conserved in all other frames moving with constant velocity? Homework Equations The Attempt at a Solution Not sure what to do... thanks

This seems like such a simple question and I feel like an idiot asking it, but here goes: If we have a hydrogen atom (not molecule) at "rest" and we shoot an electron at it with a certain known energy, what could happen? To me, it seems as though there are two distinct outcomes; either the...