What happens to the gravitational force if the mass of one object is tripled?
Practice Questions
1 question
Q1
What happens to the gravitational force if the mass of one object is tripled?
It becomes three times stronger
It becomes six times stronger
It remains the same
It becomes nine times stronger
The gravitational force is directly proportional to the product of the masses, so tripling one mass triples the force.
Questions & Step-by-step Solutions
1 item
Q
Q: What happens to the gravitational force if the mass of one object is tripled?
Solution: The gravitational force is directly proportional to the product of the masses, so tripling one mass triples the force.
Steps: 5
Step 1: Understand that gravitational force depends on the masses of two objects and the distance between them.
Step 2: Recall the formula for gravitational force: F = G * (m1 * m2) / r^2, where F is the force, G is the gravitational constant, m1 and m2 are the masses, and r is the distance between the centers of the two masses.
Step 3: If we triple the mass of one object (let's say m1 becomes 3 * m1), the formula becomes F = G * (3 * m1 * m2) / r^2.
Step 4: Notice that the new force is now three times the original force because we multiplied m1 by 3.
Step 5: Conclude that tripling the mass of one object results in tripling the gravitational force between the two objects.