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SAT Subject Test: hysics

Subjects : sat, science, physics
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
  • If you are not ready to take this test, you can study here.
  • Match each statement with the correct term.
  • Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.

This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. An object cannot be cooled to absolute zero.






2. The bending of light at the corners of objects or as it passes through narrow slits or apertures.






3. The time it takes a system to pass through one cycle of its repetitive motion. The period - T - is the inverse of the motion's frequency - f = 1/T.






4. The points of maximum negative displacement along a wave. They are the opposite of wave crests.






5. The standing wave with the lowest frequency that is supported by a string with both ends tied down is called the fundamental - or resonance - of the string. The wavelength of the fundamental is twice the length of the string - .






6. Defined as the rate at which work is done - or the rate at which energy is transformed. P is measured in joules per second (J/s) - or watts (W).






7. A logorithmic unit for measuring the volume of sound - which is the square of the amplitude of sound waves.






8. The tendency of an object to remain at a constant velocity - or its resistance to being accelerated. Newton's First Law is alternatively called the Law of Inertia because it describes this tendency.






9. The two shorter sides of a right triangle that meet at the right angle.






10. The application of kinematics to understand why objects move the way they do. More precisely - dynamics is the study of how forces cause motion.






11. A principle derived by Werner Heisenberg in 1927 that tells us that we can never know both the position and the momentum of a particle at any given time.






12. The velocity at any given instant in time. To be contrasted with average velocity - which is a measure of the change in displacement over a given time interval.






13. The spectrum containing all the different kinds of electromagnetic waves - ranging in wavelength and frequency.






14. The unit for measuring pressure. One Pascal is equal to one Newton per meter squared - 1 Pa = 1 N/m2.






15. A wedge or a slide. The dynamics of objects sliding down inclined planes is a popular topic on SAT II Physics.






16. An equation - PV = nRT - that relates the pressure - volume - temperature - and quantity of an ideal gas. An ideal gas is one that obeys the approximations laid out in the kinetic theory of gases.






17. The amount of heat necessary to transform a solid at a given temperature into a liquid of the same temperature - or the amount of heat needed to be removed from a liquid of a given temperature to transform it into a solid of the same temperature.






18. The time - T - required for a rigid body to complete one revolution.






19. The substance that is displaced as a wave propagates through it. Air is the medium for sound waves - the string is the medium of transverse waves on a string - and water is the medium for ocean waves. Note that even if the waves in a given medium tra






20. Body diagram- Illustrates the forces acting on an object - drawn as vectors originating from the center of the object.






21. A vector quantity defined as the rate of change of the displacement vector with time. It is to be contrasted with speed - which is a scalar quantity for which no direction is specified.






22. A frequency - f - defined as the number of revolutions a rigid body makes in a given time interval. It is a scalar quantity commonly denoted in units of Hertz (Hz) or s-1.






23. For an oscillating spring - the restoring force exerted by the spring is directly proportional to the displacement. That is - the more the spring is displaced - the stronger the force that will pull toward the equilibrium position. This law is expres

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24. Also called a diverging lens - a lens that is thinner in the middle than at the edges. Concave lenses refract light away from a focal point.






25. An area of high air pressure that acts as the wave trough for sound waves. The spacing between successive rarefactions is the wavelength of sound - and the number of successive areas of rarefaction that arrive at the ear per second is the frequency -






26. Given the period - T - and semimajor axis - a - of a planet's orbit - the ratio is the same for every planet.

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27. A measurement of a body's inertia - or resistance to being accelerated.






28. The motion of a body in a circular path with constant speed.






29. A positively charged particle that - along with the neutron - occupies the nucleus of the atom.






30. The particles and energy released by the fission or fusion of one atom may trigger the fission or fusion of further atoms. In a chain reaction - fission or fusion is rapidly transferred to a large number of atoms - releasing tremendous amounts of ene






31. Two materials are in thermal equilibrium if they are at the same temperature.






32. The movement of a rigid body's center of mass in space.






33. The speed at which a wave crest or trough propagates. Note that this is not the speed at which the actual medium (like the stretched string or the air particles) moves.






34. Done when energy is transferred by a force. The work done by a force F in displacing an object by s is W = F · s.






35. An experiment in 1879 that showed that the speed of light is constant to all observers. Einstein used the results of this experiment as support for his theory of special relativity.






36. Waves produced by a source that is moving with respect to the observer will seem to have a higher frequency and smaller wavelength if the motion is towards the observer - and a lower frequency and longer wavelength if the motion is away from the obse






37. The study of the properties of visible light - i.e. - the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum with wavelengths between 360 and 780 nm (1 nm = m/s).






38. The energy of a particle rotating around an axis.






39. For a reflected light ray - . In other words - a ray of light reflects of a surface in the same plane as the incident ray and the normal - and at an angle to the normal that is equal to the angle between the incident ray and the normal.






40. The net change - - in a point's angular position - . It is a scalar quantity.






41. The units of frequency - defined as inverse-seconds (1 Hz = 1 s-1). "Hertz" can be used interchangeably with "cycles per second."






42. In radioactive substances - the number of nuclei that decay per second. Activity - A - will be larger in large samples of radioactive material - since there will be more nuclei.






43. The energy of the molecules that make up an object. It is related to heat - which is the amount of energy transferred from one object to another object that is a different temperature.






44. A measure of force per unit area. Pressure is measured in N/m2 or Pa.






45. The phenomenon of light bouncing off a surface - such as a mirror.






46. The experience of being in free fall. If you are in a satellite - elevator - or other free-falling object - then you have a weight of zero Newtons relative to that object.






47. The stable position of a system where the net force acting on the object is zero.






48. A constant in the numerator of a formula.






49. In the Bohr model of the atom - the state in which an electron has the least energy and orbits closest to the nucleus.






50. The number - N - of neutrons in an atomic nucleus.