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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. The series of standing waves supported by a string with both ends tied down. The first member of the series - called the fundamental - has two nodes at the ends and one anti-node in the middle. The higher harmonics are generated by placing an integra






2. The distance between successive wave crests - or troughs. Wavelength is measured in meters and is related to frequency and wave speed by = v/f.






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






4. The unit of magnetic flux - equal to one T · m2.






5. The temperature at which a material will change phase from solid to liquid or liquid to solid.






6. The force that causes simple harmonic motion. The restoring force is always directed toward an object's equilibrium position.






7. F = ma. The net force - F - acting on an object causes the object to accelerate - a. The magnitude of the acceleration is directly proportional to the net force on the object and inversely proportional to the mass - m - of the object.

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8. 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






9. A system that no external net force acts upon. Objects within the system may exert forces upon one another - but they cannot receive any impulse from outside forces. Momentum is conserved in isolated systems.






10. A wave that interferes with its own reflection so as to produce oscillations which stand still - rather than traveling down the length of the medium. Standing waves on a string with both ends tied down make up the harmonic series.






11. The current induced in a circuit by a change in magnetic flux.






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






13. With spherical mirrors - the center of the sphere of which the mirror is a part. All of the normals pass through it.






14. The amount of error that's possible in a given measurement.






15. When dealing with reflection or refraction - the incident ray is the ray of light before it strikes the reflecting or refracting surface.






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






17. Energy cannot be made or destroyed; energy can only be changed from one place to another or from one form to another.






18. A quantity that possesses a magnitude but not a direction. Mass and length are common examples.






19. The number of hydrogen atoms in one gram of hydrogen - equal to . When counting the number of molecules in a gas - it is often convenient to count them in moles.






20. A means of defining the direction of the cross product vector. To define the direction of the vector - position your right hand so that your fingers point in the direction of A - and then curl them around so that they point in the direction of B. Th






21. The process by which unstable nuclei spontaneously release particles and/or energy so as to come to a more stable arrangement. The most common forms of radioactive decay are alpha decay - beta decay - and gamma decay.






22. The straight line that runs through the focal point and the vertex of a mirror or lens.






23. The lowest theoretical temperature a material can have - where the molecules that make up the material have no kinetic energy. Absolute zero is reached at 0 K or -273º C.






24. 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.






25. A back-and-forth movement about an equilibrium position. Springs - pendulums - and other oscillators experience harmonic motion.






26. In a right triangle - the tangent of a given angle is the length of the side opposite the angle divided by the length of the side adjacent to the triangle.






27. The amplification of one wave by another - identical wave of the same sign. Two constructively interfering waves are said to be "in phase."






28. Heat transfer via the mass movement of molecules.






29. A pendulum consists of a bob connected to a rod or rope. At small angles - a pendulum's motion approximates simple harmonic motion as it swings back and forth without friction.






30. Occurs when every point in the rigid body moves in a circular path around a line called the axis of rotation.






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






32. A conserved scalar quantity associated with the state or condition of an object or system of objects. We can roughly define energy as the capacity for an object or system to do work. There are many different types of energy - such as kinetic energy -






33. The cosine of an angle in a right triangle is equal to the length of the side adjacent to the angle divided by the length of the hypotenuse.






34. Linear momentum - p - commonly called "momentum" for short - is a vector quantity defined as the product of an object's mass - m - and its velocity - v.






35. 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 -






36. The force between two surfaces moving relative to one another. The frictional force is parallel to the plane of contact between the two objects and in the opposite direction of the sliding object's motion.






37. Represented by R = 8.31 J/mol · K - the universal gas constant fits into the ideal gas law so as to relate temperature to the average kinetic energy of gas molecules.






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






39. Another word for the frequency of a sound wave.






40. The process by which a solid turns directly into gas - because it cannot exist as a liquid at a certain pressure.






41. The force that binds protons and neutrons together in the atomic nucleus.






42. In a right triangle - the sine of a given angle is the length of the side opposite the angle divided by the length of the hypotenuse.






43. A vector quantity - L - that is the rotational analogue of linear momentum. For a single particle - the angular momentum is the cross product of the particle's displacement from the axis of rotation and the particle's linear momentum - . For a rigid






44. A collision in which momentum is conserved but kinetic energy is not.






45. 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.






46. Two quantities are inversely proportional if an increase in one results in a proportional decrease in the other - and a decrease in one results in a proportional increase in the other. In a formula defining a certain quantity - those quantities to wh






47. Two oscillators that have the same frequency and amplitude - but reach their maximum displacements at different times - are said to have different phases. Similarly - two waves are in phase if their crests and troughs line up exactly - and they are o






48. The ray of light that is reflected from a mirror or other reflecting surface.






49. The angle between a reflected ray and the normal.






50. A model for the atom developed in 1913 by Niels Bohr. According to this model - the electrons orbiting a nucleus can only orbit at certain particular radii. Excited electrons may jump to a more distant radii and then return to their ground state - em