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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. In an interference or diffraction pattern - the places where there is the least light.






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






3. A collision in which both kinetic energy and momentum are conserved.






4. The center of an atom - where the protons and neutrons reside. Electrons then orbit this nucleus.






5. The square of the amplitude of a sound wave is called the sound's loudness - or volume.






6. The building blocks of all matter - atoms are made up of a nucleus consisting of protons and neutrons - and a number of electrons that orbit the nucleus. An electrically neutral atom has as many protons as it has electrons.






7. A system with many parts in periodic - or repetitive - motion. The oscillations in one part cause vibrations in nearby parts.






8. 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






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






10. 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






11. The position - of an object according to a co-ordinate system measured in s of the angle of the object from a certain origin axis. Conventionally - this origin axis is the positive x-axis.






12. An experiment by Ernest Rutherford that proved for the first time that atoms have nuclei.






13. A constant - - not to be confused with wavelength - that defines the speed at which a radioactive element undergoes decay. The greater is - the faster the element decays.






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






15. 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






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






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






18. 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






19. 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.






20. 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.






21. A scale for measuring temperature - defined such that 0K is the lowest theoretical temperature a material can have. 273K = 0ºC.






22. 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.






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






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






25. The mass difference between a nucleus and the sum of the masses of the constituent protons and neutrons.






26. 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.






27. The mass number - A - is the sum of the number of protons and neutrons in a nucleus. It is very close to the weight of that nucleus in atomic mass units.






28. 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.






29. Energy associated with an object's position in space - or configuration in relation to other objects. This is a latent form of energy - where the amount of potential energy reflects the amount of energy that potentially could be released as kinetic e






30. 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






31. 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






32. To every action - there is an equal and opposite reaction. If an object A exerts a force on another object B - B will exert on A a force equal in magnitude and opposite in direction to the force exerted by A.

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33. A wavelength - given by = h/mv - which is associated with matter. Louis de Broglie proposed the idea that matter could be treated as waves in 1923 and applied this theory successfully to small particles like electrons.






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






35. 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.






36. Waves carried by variations in air pressure. The speed of sound waves in air at room temperature and pressure is roughly 343 m/s.






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






38. Heat transfer via the mass movement of molecules.






39. The amount heat necessary to cause a substance to undergo a phase transition.






40. An object cannot be cooled to absolute zero.






41. 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.






42. 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.






43. A transfer of thermal energy from one system to another.






44. An object is called radioactive if it undergoes radioactive decay.






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






46. A form of vector multiplication - where two vectors are multiplied to produce a scalar. The dot product of two vectors - A and B - is expressed by the equation A · B = AB cos .






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






48. In oscillation - a cycle occurs when an object undergoing oscillatory motion completes a "round-trip." For instance - a pendulum bob released at angle has completed one cycle when it swings to and then back to again. In period motion - a cycle is the






49. An almost massless particle of neutral charge that is released along with a beta particle in beta decay.






50. A unit vector is a vector with length 1.