Question

Please discuss

Let’s take a break from all of the “book learning” and explore the world around you. For these assignments your writing will be focused on Everyday Physics which will help you connect your Readings to things that have happened in the world around you. Your posts should be interesting and well written.

In this module, you will look for an article or news story/video that relates to one or more of the following topics:

• Special relativity
• Photons
• Photoelectric effect
• Quantum mechanics

Answer 1

Special Relativity

Global Positioning System

Without compensating for relativistic effects, a GPS unit that tells you it's, say, 0.8 km, to the next gas station would be 5 miles (8 km) off after only one day.

"Because an observer on the ground sees the satellites in motion relative to them, Special Relativity predicts that we should see their clocks ticking more slowly,"

Photons

Basically, photons are particles of light. They're used in pretty much anything related to light.

Examples of photons in life:

• Camera
• X-ray
• UV radiation
• electromagnetic spectrum
• visible light humans see
• solar panels
• sunlight

Photoelectric effect:-

PV modules generate electricity from sunlight.

CCD in phones and cameras create videos and pictures.

Infrared night vision helps capture criminals.

Scanners in your printers transfer analog images to digital

Quantum mechanics

Your smart phone. Your eyeballs. Digital cameras. Definitely the little Flash cards used to store all your camera's photos and your phone's apps. But seriously, every transistor is a quantum mechanical device. As is any device, your eyeballs included, that can convert a stream of photons into an electrical signal.