Energy and Thermodynamics Trivia

1. What type of friction is air resistance?

From Quiz Air Resistance: It's All Around You!

Answer: fluid friction

Air resistance is fluid friction. Air resistance occurs between the surface of a falling object and the air that surrounds it. Rolling friction occurs when a rounded surface moves over a solid and sliding friction occurs when a solid moves over another solid. Static friction occurs when a solid touches another solid but there is no movement.

From Quiz Different Types of Energy Storage

Answer: Flywheel

Flywheels store energy as kinetic-mechanical energy. A flywheel's spinning wheel is levitated by a magnet inside a vacuum, which reduces almost all friction. The concentric wheel is made of high-tensile-strength fibers embedded in epoxy resins. These wheels spin at 200,000 - 100,000 rpm. Speed is everything: the faster the flywheel can go, the more power it can store. If scientists could make even stronger material, then someday flywheels could hold many terajoules of energy. A terajoule is equal to a thousand billion joules. It takes about 30,000 joules to make a cup of tea. Only a few terajoules were used to power astronauts to the moon and back. Flywheels can charge in fifteen minutes, and do not need maintenance for twenty years. They are lightweight, reliable and have a ninety-five percent power efficiency. Flywheels are not affected by the weather like chemical batteries, and do not hurt the environment. In the 1950's, flywheel powered buses were used in Yverdon, Switzerland. Flywheels were also used in steam engines of the 1970's. The main disadvantage of flywheels is that they can explode at any second because the wheel inside is spinning so fast.

From Quiz Radiation: Energy from a Distance

Answer: Electromagnetic radiation

Okay, if you hear the word 'radiation' and immediately picture glowing green barrels or someone walking stiffly around in a lead suit, you just might have watched too much television (my people!). The truth is actually much less dramatic. Radiation is energy traveling through space, and we're being bombarded by it all the time. It's not intrinsically good or bad, it just is. The kind of radiation, the amount you receive, and the duration of that reception all play a role in how much our bodies care for the experience. Light itself is radiation, which means everything you see is produced by it. Radio waves? Radiation. Microwaves warming up your leftover pizza? Also radiation. These are all parts of the same family known as electromagnetic radiation, which is simply energy traveling through space as oscillating electric and magnetic fields. Eww. How about an analogy? Imagine electromagnetic radiation as a tiny, invisible bundle of energy that moves outward like a ripple in a pond. However, instead of moving through water, it moves through empty space or the air or sometimes even your body. This energy is made up of electricity and magnetism. They work together like best buddies, constantly pushing each other along to keep the wave moving forward. It's not a perfect analogy by any means, but it's something to build off of if you're new to the concept. Anyway, those invisible bundles of energy? They're called photons, and you're being absolutely bombarded with them right now. (Don't panic!) The electromagnetic radiation family is quite large. On the low energy end of the spectrum, you have radio waves with wavelengths that can stretch for miles, allowing you to pick up music, sports talk, and the latest conspiracy theories, all from the comfort of your car. A little more energy, a little higher up on the spectrum, we get to microwaves and infrared waves. Keep strolling up the spectrum, and you reach visible light, that narrow little slice our eyes evolved to notice. Past violet, things get very spicy: ultraviolet, X-rays, and gamma rays. Same basic phenomenon, just with shorter wavelengths and more energetic photons. These are the parts of the electromagnetic spectrum that can be a danger in high doses. If you think of the spectrum as a piano keyboard, we can only see a small cluster of keys in the middle of it. And those 'higher-frequency' keys to the right of what we can see? Best to leave those to the professional keyboardists. So, the light bouncing off your hand right now? Totally harmless electromagnetic radiation. In fact, your hand is also sneakily emitting infrared radiation (Eek!) because it's warm. Everything above absolute zero does this. So, relax. Radiation or no radiation, we're not ready to film your superhero original story just yet. The next question helps explain a big reason why not.

From Quiz Heat and Thermodynamics

Answer: British Thermal Unit

The Btu is often used to denote the energy-producing or energy-transferring capability of heating and cooling systems and computer equipment.

From Quiz Air Resistance: It's All Around You!

Answer: size and shape

Size and shape are the two factors that affect air resistance. Air resistance works with surface area, so the more surface area, the more air resistance. Think about when you drop two pieces of paper: one crumpled and one flat. The crumpled one falls faster because there is less air resistance acting on the paper.

From Quiz Different Types of Energy Storage

Answer: Superconducting

Superconducting magnetic energy storage stores energy in the form of electromagnetic energy. This system is made up of a coil of ceramic superconducting wire that is being cooled by liquid. The coil of ceramic needs to be cooled because ceramics will only be superconductive at -400 degrees Fahrenheit. This superconductive temperature is much higher than all other materials. The advantages of this storage system are that the system can turn on within a millisecond, as opposed to normal batteries which take minutes. Also, superconducting magnetic energy storage systems have virtually zero energy loss. Another advantage is that superconductors can hold 7,000 times more energy than copper wire with respect to their size. However, they can only be made with expensive materials, which are hard to shape.

From Quiz Radiation: Energy from a Distance

Answer: The ozone layer

For us, nothing produces more energy and radiation on a consistent basis than that big bright ball in the sky. The ozone layer lives a sedentary life mostly in the stratosphere, about 10 to 30 miles (roughly 16 to 48 kilometers) above the ground. It has one vitally important job, at least from our perspective. It absorbs a big bulk of the Sun's ultraviolet radiation before it gets the chance to fry the living daylights out of everything on the surface. Without it, it's easy to picture a world where gingers would be catching fire, and immolation is not the goal of science. Ozone itself is just a molecule made of three oxygen atoms stuck together. Oxygen prefers to hang out in monogamous pairs (O₂), which is what we breathe (and what makes immolation so much easier). Sometimes, O₂ likes to get a little freaky and invite company over. Enter ozone or O₃. When UV light hits ozone, it absorbs the energy and splits apart. The pieces then recombine with other oxygen molecules to form new ozone. It sounds weird, but ozone is always doing this nutty trick. Just soaking up UV waves, breaking apart, and then reforming with new partners. Whatever keeps your marriage fresh, I guess. Despite protecting us from all kinds of badness, our bodies don't exactly love it. Ground level ozone is particularly nasty for people with asthma or other medical conditions. If you're wondering, most of the nastier short wavelength Electromagnetic radiation (EMR) such as gamma rays and X-rays is absorbed much higher up by nitrogen and plain old monogamous oxygen molecules in the thermosphere and ionosphere.

From Quiz Heat and Thermodynamics

Answer: Gabriel Fahrenheit

Fahrenheit is famous for his temperature scale, widely used in the United States. To convert from Fahrenheit to Celsius, subtract 32 from the Fahrenheit value and multiply the result by 5/9. The inverse equation can convert Celsius to Fahrenheit - simply multiply the Celsius value by 9/5 and then add 32. Additionally, to convert a temperature into Kelvin, take a Celsius value and add 273.

From Quiz Air Resistance: It's All Around You!

Answer: Up

Air resistance pushes up while gravity attracts an object downwards. This is true for objects falling straight down. If the object was falling left or right, then air resistance would be opposite. If both gravity and air resistance pulled down, then air resistance wouldn't be air resistance! Air resistance is the opposite of gravity for an object falling down.

From Quiz Different Types of Energy Storage

Answer: Pumped Hydroelectric

Pumped Hydroelectric energy storage systems store energy as potential energy. They only have a thirty-percent energy efficiency because the water needs to be pumped back up to the dam. But the real problem is that dams have a major ecological effect on the environment. The biggest pumped hydro storage plant is in Ludington, Michigan. It can store 15,000 megawatt hours of energy. In the future pumped-hydro storage areas might be in underground rivers and streams. This would minimize damage to above ground rivers, which support more living things, and would hide the ugly dams from sight.

From Quiz Radiation: Energy from a Distance

Answer: X-rays

You know what X-rays are. You've probably gotten them. But do you know what X-rays ARE? Well, let me tell you. They are a high-energy form of electromagnetic radiation (them again) with wavelengths shorter than visible light. That's the kind that can be dangerous with prolonged, intense exposure. Because they carry more energy, X-rays can pass right through soft tissues like skin and muscle. Your bones are another story. They're denser and absorb x-rays much more easily. The result is a shadowy image where bones show up bright and clear (well, mostly), while everything squishier looks much darker. The discovery of X-rays happened in 1895 when German physicist Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen was playing with electrical currents in vacuum tubes, as one does. He noticed a mysterious kind of radiation that could pass through materials and fog photographic plates. When he tested it by taking an x-ray of his wife's hand (for 15 minutes), the resulting picture clearly showed her bones and her wedding ring. A couple of centuries earlier they would have both been burned at the stake. As for Mrs. Roentgen, well... she wasn't particularly thrilled either, reportedly saying "I have seen my death". I'm guessing she was a glass-half-empty kind of person. Still, science was pretty impressed by the feat, and Roentgen received the very first Nobel Prize in Physics in 1901.

From Quiz Heat and Thermodynamics

Answer: 0 K

This temperature scale begins at absolute zero - the temperature at which all random thermal molecular movement has ceased. Absolute zero cannot be attained because heat "leaks" into an experiment from the outside world. The coldest temperature recorded in the Universe was on the surface of Neptune's moon Triton, which reached 38 K. An Oxford Instruments device called a "dilution refrigerator" can hit temperatures as low as two-thousandths of a Kelvin - just fractions away from absolute zero.

From Quiz Air Resistance: It's All Around You!

Answer: gravity

Gravity is the larger force. When a falling object is falling, it hits the ground, right? So gravity wins over air resistance. If air resistance was the greater force, then falling objects would just float in the air and never come down! Before terminal velocity, an object has gravity as the greater force. For example, a skydiver: the diver falls (gravity is larger) until reaching terminal velocity (equal) then when the rip cord is pulled, air resistance is larger for a short time until the diver continues to fall and reaches terminal velocity again before the diver hits the ground.

From Quiz Different Types of Energy Storage

Answer: Alessandro Volta

A chemical battery releases potential energy in the form of electricity through a chemical reaction, causing electrons to move. Chemical batteries have three different sections: the anode, cathode and electrolyte. A negatively charged electrode, called the cathode, conducts electrons. A separator, called the electrolyte, conducts ions. (Ions are electrically charged molecules and electrons are smaller negatively charged particles of an atom.) This separates the cathode from the positive electrode (called the anode) which also conducts electrons. The cathode and the anode can be made of various materials. Lead-acid batteries are used for cars. They are expensive and bulky. Silver-oxide batteries are used for hearing aids. Alkaline-Manganese batteries are used for radios and tape recorders. Carbon-Zinc batteries are used for flashlights. Nickel-Iron batteries are primarily used for back-up lighting systems. The first chemical batteries may have been made by the Parthians, who dwelled in the area of Iraq, around 200 BC. However, Alessandro Volta is considered the father of chemical batteries. He first made the voltaic pile, a battery made of a pile of zinc and copper, which had brine soaked cloth between them. The voltaic pile was the first chemical battery that produced direct current. Direct current is electrical current that can only flow in one direction. Direct current is good for automobiles, ships and locomotives, because it is steady. Alternating current is electrical current that moves both ways based on whether the dynamo is turning up or going down. A dynamo, which converts mechanical energy into electrical energy, is necessary for the production of alternating current. Chemical batteries have an energy efficiency of 80%. They are compact, heavy, and toxic, and take hours to charge. If the batteries get too cold, they have a reduced capacity. If the batteries get too hot, the battery's life is shortened. Chemical batteries work from one to seven years. The biggest advantage of chemical batteries is that they are very cheap. This is the result of many decades of specialization in chemical batteries. The world's largest chemical battery storage system is in Chino, California, which has 8,000 lead-acid batteries.

From Quiz Radiation: Energy from a Distance

Answer: Ionizing radiation

Your boring basic run-of the mill carbon atom has 6 protons, 6 neutrons, and 6 electrons. But what if we play doctor? Remove a proton, and it's not carbon anymore, so we'll just leave them alone, because boron is lame. Add or remove a neutron we have an isotope. Same atom, slightly different properties, some of which can make uranium more willing to go boom. Add or remove an electron? Well, that's an ion. Since we're adding or taking away a charged particle (electrons have a negative charge) from a neutral atom, the protons and electrons don't balance, and the atom is charged. Ionizing radiation may sound like something available only in a supervillain catalog... and yeah, that's kind of what it is. It has enough energy to knock electrons off atoms or molecules. When that happens, the atom becomes an ion. This act of atomic vandalism can cause harm to human cells by disrupting chemical bonds. Hence the whole supervillain thing. Examples of ionizing radiation are many. X-rays, gamma rays, and some types of ultraviolet radiation are all electromagnetic radiation that will happily steal an atom's lunch money. Other forms of high-energy radiation, such as alpha and beta particles, do the same. These carry enough punch to interact strongly with matter. Inside living tissue, that can mean breaking DNA strands or altering molecules that cells rely on to function. Not cool. In high doses over prolonged periods, it can do a lot of damage. However, in controlled amounts, ionizing radiation can be incredibly useful. Medical imaging, cancer radiation therapy, and sterilization of medical equipment all rely on the same basic principle. Meanwhile, most of the radiation we encounter every day is non-ionizing. Radio waves, microwaves, infrared, and visible light simply do not have enough energy per photon to yank your electrons. They can still transfer energy, often as heat, but they do not typically rearrange atomic structures the way ionizing radiation can. So the Wi-Fi signal bouncing around your living room is energetic, sure, but it is not out there ripping electrons loose like a hooligan.

From Quiz Air Resistance: It's All Around You!

Answer: The air resistance increases

The drag increases as the speed of an object increases. That means that there is more friction as an object gets faster. That's why when a space shuttle or rocket comes back down to earth, there has to be fireproof shields. The speed is so great that there is enough friction to start a fire.

From Quiz Different Types of Energy Storage

Answer: Compressed air

Compressed air storage compresses air with excess electricity. This is another example of potential energy. Energy is produced when the pressure that is built up is released. This pressure powers a turbine and creates electricity. Since the air is pressurized, it gets really hot. To avoid heat-related damage, the storage area needs to be cooled down. Also, the storage area must be airtight. Many compressed air energy storage plants are built in abandoned mines. Because mines are usually very large, compressed air storage can hold lots of energy. The pressure in the storage area is between 800 and 1,600 pounds per square inch. (Normal air pressure is fourteen pounds per square inch.) Earthquakes can collapse the abandoned mine, which would destroy the plant. Another problem with compressed air storage is that it does not respond quickly. It takes thirty minutes to start producing electricity, whereas other types of batteries take seconds. Compressed air storage has an energy efficiency of eighty percent. The largest compressed air storage plant is in Norton, Ohio. Compressed air storage does not hurt the environment as much as pumped hydroelectric storage because it is underground.

From Quiz Heat and Thermodynamics

Answer: Entropy

Entropy is the tendency for energy to spread out from one physical location or energetic state.

From Quiz Thermodynamics - The Heat Is On

Answer: One-way direction

Under the Second Law, a spontaneous process has a tendency to achieve a more disordered state. In other words, the natural course of events brings an isolated system to a state of higher entropy, entropy being a measure of the system's disorder. As an example, when liquid water is added to alcohol the molecules of both liquids spontaneously mix, bringing the system to a higher state of disorder (higher entropy). The water molecules will not spontaneously separate from the alcohol molecules to create one discrete section of water and another discrete section of alcohol. Therefore the mixing of alcohol and water occurs in a one-way direction only. This gives rise to the "arrow of time" concept, which is essentially "before and after". If provided with two states of a system, one less disordered and one more disordered, it can be assumed that the more disordered state occurred later in time. This question was created by Phoenix Rising team member purelyqing.

From Quiz Air Resistance: It's All Around You!

Answer: gravity is the only force acting upon the object

When an object has no forces acting upon it other than gravity, the object is in free fall. The only time this would happen is if the object would be in a vacuum (i.e space). All objects would accelerate at the same rate, which is 9.8 m/s/s.

From Quiz Heat and Thermodynamics

Answer: Exothermic

An easy way to remember the difference between exothermy and endothermy is to recall their Latin roots. The prefix exo- means "outside," while endo- means "inside." The EXOskeleton is on the outside of an insect, while the ENDOcrine glands secrete hormones inside a body. Thermal refers to heat, so an exothermic reaction creates heat.

From Quiz Air Resistance: It's All Around You!

Answer: where all matter is removed

A vacuum is created when there is no air resistance (specifically, no air). A great example of a vacuum is space. If there was no air resistance in the world, every object would accelerate to the earth at 9.8 m/s/s, regardless of size and shape. A vacuum can also be created in a laboratory by taking a tube and sucking all of the air out of it, then dropping two objects inside. They drop at the same rate.

From Quiz Heat and Thermodynamics

Answer: Hess' Law

Hess' Law is used to find the enthalpy of a reaction. Enthalpy does not depend on the mechanism used (the "pathway") to change the heat; rather, it depends on the inital and final state of the reactants and products.

From Quiz Thermodynamics - The Heat Is On

Answer: Zeroth

The Zeroth Law of Thermodynamics defines thermal equilibrium. If System A is in thermal equilibrium with System B, and System B is in thermal equilibrium with System C, then System A and System C are also in thermal equilibrium with each other. A classic example of the Zeroth Law is the thermometer. Because two systems that are in physical contact will be in thermal equilibrium with one another, a calibrated instrument (i.e. the thermometer) can be used to determine the property of thermal equilibrium (i.e. the temperature) of the system that it is in contact with. The Zeroth Law was established after the first three laws of thermodynamics were postulated. However, because of its importance as the very definition of thermal equilibrium (a property we know as temperature), the Zeroth Law should rightfully head the list. Therefore it was named the Zeroth (0th) Law to precede the existing three laws. This question was created by Phoenix Rising team member purelyqing.

From Quiz Air Resistance: It's All Around You!

Answer: terminal velocity

Terminal velocity is when an object stops accelerating. The net force of the air resistance and the gravity is equal to 0. Although the object will continue to fall, the object would now fall at a constant speed.

From Quiz Heat and Thermodynamics

Answer: 46 kJ

In order to solve this problem, you multiply the heat of vaporization (250 kJ/mol) by the amount of silver being condensed (20 grams) divided by the molar mass of silver (108 grams). So, 250 kJ/mol * (20 grams Ag/108 grams per mole Ag) = 46 kJ

From Quiz Thermodynamics

Answer: The law of conservation of energy

We use delta U since we are comparing the values of the internal energy before and after a reaction or process. The law of conservation of energy states that energy can neither be created nor destroyed, but it can transform from one form into another.

From Quiz Air Resistance: It's All Around You!

Answer: both they and the shuttle are in free fall

Astronauts are in free fall. When a shuttle is in orbit, the shuttle moves forward at a constant speed, but the force of gravity keeps the shuttle in free fall. This happens because the shuttle is in orbit.

From Quiz Heat and Thermodynamics

Answer: -241.82 kJ

This value is generally listed in chemistry textbooks and often included with problems regarding standard heats of formation.

From Quiz Thermodynamics - The Heat Is On

Answer: The rate of cooling in black coffee is greater than white coffee but you can drink white coffee sooner

Where there is a larger difference between two temperatures, the rate of cooling is greater. There are three temperatures in this scenario: the initial temperature of the black coffee near boiling point (TB), the temperature of the white coffee immediately after milk is added to the near boiling coffee (TB-n), and the temperature at which cooling coffee can be first drunk (TD). As TB is greater than (TB-n), the rate of cooling between TB and TD will be greater than the rate of cooling between (TB-n) and TD. However the added milk to black coffee immediately drops the temperature of the white coffee. Therefore while the rate of cooling to drinkable temperature in white coffee is less, the difference between the initial (white coffee) temperature and the drinkable temperature is less than the difference between the initial (black coffee) temperature and the drinkable temperature, hence the drinkable temperature is reached earlier in white coffee than black coffee. (This is actually a true story. I asked the Biology teacher if I could explain on the black board. I used calculus and derivatives to explain why she was wrong. I then had to repeat the exercise in front of all the science faculty. I was mortified (but vindicated)). This question was created by Phoenix Rising team member 1nn1.

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