PHYS51 - Introduction to Position, Velocity, and Acceleration

This is the second in a series of courses that cover the basic quantities of physics, and on the basic mathematics involved in their definition.

This course introduces the vector quantities of position, velocity, and acceleration. In addition, some concepts from calculus will be introduced and their relationship to the quantities. This will show some of the motivation for the invention of the calculus by Newton and independently by Leibniz. Knowledge of calculus is not assumed, but it would be worthwhile to independently take MATH119 and MATH120 to get a better understanding of the mathematics.

The course outline is as follows:

• Introduction
• The Position Vector
  • Definition of Position
  • Specification of position
    • Cartesian Coordinates
    • Cartesian Coordinate Transformations
    • Plane polar coordinates (2D)
    • Spherical coordinates (3D)
  • Measurement of angle
  • Measurement of position
    • Radar. Lidar, and Sonar
    • Surveying
    • Photogrammetry and Motion Capture
    • Coordinate Measuring Machines
• Velocity and Speed
  • Definition of Velocity
  • The Derivative
  • Velocity Revisited
  • Measurement of Velocity
  • Determining Position from Velocity
  • The Integral
• Acceleration
  • Definition of Acceleration
  • Examples
  • Relationship to Force
  • Measurement of Acceleration
  • Determination of velocity and position
• Higher Order Derivatives of Position
• Summary

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