Question

Calculate the magnitude of force when applied on a body of mass \[0.5\,kg\] produces an acceleration of \[5\,m/{s^2}\].

Answer 1

Hint: We are asked to find the force required to push a body of \[0.5kg\] move at an acceleration of \[5m/{s^2}\] . Force is defined as the product of mass and acceleration of the body produced by the application of this force. Once we have the quantities in the SI units, the substitution is enough to get us to the final solution.

Formulas used:
The formula to find the force applied to a given body is given by,
\[F = ma\]
Where \[m\] is the mass of the body to which the force is applied and \[a\] is the acceleration of the body caused by the application of force.

Complete step by step answer:
Let us start by writing down the given data in the question.The mass of the object is given as, \[m = 0.5\,kg\]. The acceleration caused by the application of the force on the body is given as, \[a = 5\,m/{s^2}\]. Now one of the very important steps we miss in questions almost very directly is the units. We should check whether the given measurements are in the SI units or not. Here the quantities mass and acceleration are expressed in their SI units. Hence, we can directly substitute the values into the formula, \[F = ma\]
Substituting we get,
\[F = ma \\
\Rightarrow F = 0.5 \times 5 \\
\therefore F = 2.5\,N\]

Therefore, the magnitude of force when applied on a body of mass \[0.5kg\] produces an acceleration of \[5\,m/{s^2}\] is \[2.5\,N\].

Note: The SI unit of force is newton (N). One Newton can be defined as the force that should be applied to an object that has unit mass (mass of the object is one kilogram) to move it at an acceleration of one meter per second squared. That is, \[1N = 1kg \times 1m/{s^2}\].