Physics

Some interesting physics: Our Sun, a fusion reactor, produces energy via the Proton-Proton Cycle within its core.  The series of reactions starts with the fusion of two proton paris and ends with one helium nucleus and a proton pair.  About 600 million tons of protons are convert to He each second.  At that rate, the sun being so massive has a lifetime of about 10 billion years.  The photons created take many thousands of years to travel from the core to the surface of the sun, and from the surface the photons take about 8 minutes to travel to the Earth.  The light we enjoy from the sun is quite old.  


 
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s an adjunct professor I teach introductory-level physics courses, which in some ways is a challenging task, especially of physics, a subject that does not always lend itself to intuitive comprehension.  What follows are sites that illustrate fundamental concepts in physics through discussions, tutorials, animations, and practice problems.

  • http://www.physicsclassroom.com/  An excellent introduction at the high school level. This is the first site to visit when learning physics for the first time.
  • http://www.digitaldutch.com/unitconverter/  One of the first subjects a student learns in physics is unit conversion.  We convert hours to minutes and so forth in our heads, but miles to kilometers and newtons to pounds are more challenging.  This site makes it easy.
  • http://www.mathsisfun.com/sine-cosine-tangent.html  Any real attempt to learn the fundamentals of physics beginning with motion and forces will involve trigonometry.  This site is the first step to understanding the right triangle.
  • http://web.acd.ccac.edu/~mplumley/basic_trig.htm  For the Applied Physics course I teach online, this reference is all that's needed.
  • http://www.chemicool.com/  Need to know just about anything about an element.  Here is an online version of the Periodic Table.  (I know what you're thinking.  You're thinking this is for Chemistry!  No so.  It's for Physics too; for example, when calculating densities or when calculating nuclear reactions involving mass.)