Timeline for Trajectory of a free particle in a sinusoidal force field
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
3 events
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| May 15, 2022 at 13:38 | comment | added | Matteo | Yes the average velocity is positive and not negative because of the phase of the forcing field. To explore this you might consider doing the same exercise with a general force $f(t) = a \sin{(\omega t + \phi)}$ and check which values of $\phi$ make the average velocity being negative. | |
| May 15, 2022 at 10:32 | comment | added | Gabriele Giuseppini | Thanks Matteo. Indeed, having zero acceleration doesn't imply having zero velocity, that definitely helps. However, the particles goes from a state of zero average velocity to a state with positive average velocity, and I have troubles understanding why this "preference" for positive velocity - why not average negative velocity, for instance? Furthermore, I believe that this average velocity strongly depends on the phase of the sine wave, that's where I'm trying to wrap my head around... | |
| May 14, 2022 at 23:20 | history | answered | Matteo | CC BY-SA 4.0 |