Question

Please answer the three questions below. Be specific, and use diagrams where necessary. Feel free to work with others on your answers.

What do you need to measure in order to determine gravitational acceleration?

How could you potentially measure each of those quantities?

How would you then use each of those quantities to determine gravitational acceleration?

Answer 1

a)universal law of gravitation states that every body sttract another body with a force(f) which is proportionate to the product of their masses and inversely proportionate to the square of the distance.this gives us
F=GxMxm/(d)square (eq.1)
where G is the constant.
let the mass of the object be m.Gravitational force =g and since g =aceleration then in the formula F=ma we can write
F=mg
from eq .1 we can write
mg =GxMxm/(d)square
since the distance is equal to the radius of earth
therefore g=GxM/(r)square
to calculate the value of gravitational acceleration or g, we should put the value of G,M,R as
G=universal gravitational constant=6.7x10 to the power -11
M=mass of earth=6x10 to the power 24 kg
r=radius of earth=6.4x10 to the power 6 m