Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
Since the velocity of the object is the derivative of the position graph, the area under the line in the velocity vs. time graph is the displacement of the object. (Velocity is on the y-axis and time on the x-axis. Multiplying the velocity by the time, the time cancels out, and only displacement remains.)
In terms of a displacement-time (x vs. t) graph, the instantaneous velocity (or, simply, velocity) can be thought of as the slope of the tangent line to the curve at any point, and the average velocity as the slope of the secant line between two points with t coordinates equal to the boundaries of the time period for the average velocity.
Different from instantaneous speed, average speed is defined as the total distance covered divided by the time interval. For example, if a distance of 80 kilometres is driven in 1 hour, the average speed is 80 kilometres per hour. Likewise, if 320 kilometres are travelled in 4 hours, the average speed is also 80 kilometres per hour.
Equation [3] involves the average velocity v + v 0 / 2 . Intuitively, the velocity increases linearly, so the average velocity multiplied by time is the distance traveled while increasing the velocity from v 0 to v, as can be illustrated graphically by plotting velocity against time as a straight line graph. Algebraically, it follows ...
For instance, if a vehicle travels a certain distance d outbound at a speed x (e.g. 60 km/h) and returns the same distance at a speed y (e.g. 20 km/h), then its average speed is the harmonic mean of x and y (30 km/h), not the arithmetic mean (40 km/h). The total travel time is the same as if it had traveled the whole distance at that average speed.
In contrast to an average velocity, referring to the overall motion in a finite time interval, the instantaneous velocity of an object describes the state of motion at a specific point in time. It is defined by letting the length of the time interval Δ t {\displaystyle \Delta t} tend to zero, that is, the velocity is the time derivative of the ...
Light moves at a speed of 299,792,458 m/s, or 299,792.458 kilometres per second (186,282.397 mi/s), in a vacuum. The speed of light in vacuum (or ) is also the speed of all massless particles and associated fields in a vacuum, and it is the upper limit on the speed at which energy, matter, information or causation can travel. The speed of light ...
Speed is the distance covered per unit of time. One cannot track the speed of every vehicle; so, in practice, average speed is measured by sampling vehicles in a given area over a period of time. Two definitions of average speed are identified: "time mean speed" and "space mean speed".