A figure skater pulls in her arms while spinning. What happens to her angular mo

A figure skater pulls in her arms while spinning. What happens to her angular momentum?

A figure skater pulls in her arms while spinning. What happens to her angular momentum?

Step 1: Understand what angular momentum is. It is a measure of how much motion an object has while spinning.
Step 2: Know that angular momentum is conserved in a closed system, meaning it doesn't change unless an external force acts on it.
Step 3: When the figure skater pulls in her arms, she changes her shape but not her total angular momentum.
Step 4: Since she pulls her arms in, her moment of inertia decreases. Moment of inertia is how mass is distributed in relation to the axis of rotation.
Step 5: Because her moment of inertia decreases and angular momentum is conserved, her angular velocity must increase to keep the angular momentum constant.
Step 6: Therefore, as she pulls her arms in, she spins faster.

Conservation of Angular Momentum – Angular momentum of a system remains constant if no external torque acts on it.
Effect of Radius on Angular Velocity – When a figure skater pulls in her arms, she decreases her moment of inertia, which causes her angular velocity to increase to conserve angular momentum.