A child is sitting on a merry-go-round that is spinning. If the child moves closer to the center, what happens to the angular velocity of the merry-go-round?
Practice Questions
1 question
Q1
A child is sitting on a merry-go-round that is spinning. If the child moves closer to the center, what happens to the angular velocity of the merry-go-round?
Increases
Decreases
Remains the same
Becomes zero
As the child moves closer to the center, the moment of inertia decreases, causing the angular velocity to increase to conserve angular momentum.
Questions & Step-by-step Solutions
1 item
Q
Q: A child is sitting on a merry-go-round that is spinning. If the child moves closer to the center, what happens to the angular velocity of the merry-go-round?
Solution: As the child moves closer to the center, the moment of inertia decreases, causing the angular velocity to increase to conserve angular momentum.
Steps: 6
Step 1: Understand that the merry-go-round is spinning and has a certain speed called angular velocity.
Step 2: Know that the child sitting on the merry-go-round has a certain distance from the center.
Step 3: When the child moves closer to the center, they are reducing the distance from the center of the merry-go-round.
Step 4: Recognize that moving closer to the center decreases the moment of inertia, which is a measure of how much mass is spread out from the center.
Step 5: Remember the principle of conservation of angular momentum, which states that if no external forces act on the system, the total angular momentum remains constant.
Step 6: Since the moment of inertia decreases when the child moves closer to the center, the angular velocity must increase to keep the angular momentum constant.
