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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 acceleration of a body experiencing uniform circular motion. This acceleration is always directed toward the center of the circle.






2. A wave with wave crests that propagate down the length of the medium - in contrast to stationary standing waves. The velocity at which a crest propagates is called the wave speed.






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






4. The cancellation of one wave by another wave that is exactly out of phase with the first. Despite the dramatic name of this phenomenon - nothing is "destroyed" by this interference—the two waves emerge intact once they have passed each other.






5. A force caused by the roughness of two materials in contact - deformations in the materials - and a molecular attraction between the materials. Frictional forces are always parallel to the plane of contact between two surfaces and opposite the direct






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






7. States that the current induced in a circuit by a change in magnetic flux is in the direction that will oppose that change in flux. Using the right-hand rule - point your thumb in the opposite direction of the change in magnetic flux. The direction y

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8. A device made of two coils - which converts current of one voltage into current of another voltage. In a step-up transformer - the primary coil has fewer turns than the secondary - thus increasing the voltage. In a step-down transformer - the seconda






9. The name of an electron released from the surface of a metal due to the photoelectric effect.






10. 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.






11. In reference to oscillation - amplitude is the maximum displacement of the oscillator from its equilibrium position. Amplitude tells how far an oscillator is swinging back and forth. In periodic motion - amplitude is the maximum displacement in each






12. A property of a metal - the minimum frequency of electromagnetic radiation that is necessary to release photoelectrons from that metal.






13. 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.






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






15. The distance between the focal point and the vertex of a mirror or lens. For concave mirrors and convex lenses - this number is positive. For convex mirrors and concave lenses - this number is negative.






16. 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.






17. The coefficient of static friction - for two materials is the constant of proportionality between the normal force and the maximum force of static friction. It is always a number between zero and one.






18. A particle - identical to an electron. Beta particles are ejected from an atom in the process of beta decay.






19. The point of a mirror or lens where all light that runs parallel to the principal axis will be focused. Concave mirrors and convex lenses are designed to focus light into the focal point. Convex mirrors and concave lenses focus light away from the fo






20. 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).






21. 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.






22. 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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23. The amount of energy that metal must absorb before it can release a photoelectron from the metal.






24. The building blocks of all matter - quarks are the constituent parts of protons - neutrons - and mesons.






25. When an object is held in circular motion about a massive body - like a planet or a sun - due to the force of gravity - that object is said to be in orbit. Objects in orbit are in perpetual free fall - and so are therefore weightless.






26. The state of a nonrotating object upon whom the net torque acting is zero.






27. With spherical mirrors - the radius of the sphere of which the mirror is a part.






28. The principle stating that for any isolated system - linear momentum is constant with time.






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






30. A nuclear reaction in which a high-energy neutron bombards a heavy - unstable atomic nucleus - causing it to split into two smaller nuclei - and releasing some neutrons and a vast amount of energy at the same time






31. The separation of different color light via refraction.






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






33. A neutrally charged particle that - along with protons - constitutes the nucleus of an atom.






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






35. 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.






36. The number of digits that have been accurately measured. When combining several measurements in a formula - the resulting calculation can only have as many significant digits as the measurement that has the smallest number of significant digits.






37. For a gas held at a constant temperature - pressure and volume are inversely proportional.

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38. An image created by a mirror or lens in such a way that light does actually come from where the image appears to be. If you place a screen in front of a real image - the image will be projected onto the screen.






39. 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.






40. 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.






41. 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 -






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






43. The property of a vector that distinguishes it from a scalar: while scalars have only a magnitude - vectors have both a magnitude and a direction. When graphing vectors in the xy-coordinate space - direction is usually given by the angle measured cou






44. A push or a pull that causes an object to accelerate.






45. An image created by a mirror or lens in such a way that light does not actually come from where the image appears to be.






46. A unit for measuring angles; also called a "rad." 2p rad = 360º.






47. 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.






48. A vector quantity - equal to the rate of change of the angular velocity vector with time. It is typically given in units of rad/s2.






49. 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.






50. A rigid body's resistance to being rotated. The moment of inertia for a single particle is MR2 - where M is the mass of the rigid body and R is the distance to the rotation axis. For rigid bodies - calculating the moment of inertia is more complicate