General Relativity

Daniel Miranian
Period-7
Journal 4-8

I. I found out from wikipedia that the first recorded capacitor was invented in October of 1745 by Ewald Georg von Kleist of Germany. It was made using a glass jar with water in it. Somehow electricity was built up inside the jar then when it was ready to be discharged it was released through the mouth of the jar. Benjamin Franklin proved that the charge was stored in the glass, not the water as previously believed.

II. This week was my first time back in physics class in more than two weeks. On Monday we finished up our electricity and wave lab packets. Then on Wednesday we learned more about sound and resonance. We watched really cool video about a bridge that collapsed because the wind caused it to oscillate at its natural frequency. We also looked out how different waves have different frequencies. The visible light spectrum that we can see is near the middle of the electromagnetic spectrum. As the frequency increases the wavelength decreases and visa-versa. Gamma rays are to one extreme for having the smallest wavelength while radio waves are on the other with having the longest wavelength. On Friday we started to watch a video on general relativity and string theory. We had already watched a lot of this video earlier in the year. However, the new things on the video were very interesting. The video talked about how Einstein was looking for an equation to relate everything in the universe together but looking at things on a large scale. On the other hand, other scientists at the time were looking inward to discover the mysteries of the universe. What they came up with is known as quantum mechanics. Surprisingly, the way that they explained it in the video made a lot of sense. It seems like a lot of it relates heavily to some of the things I learned about in AP chemistry this year such as Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle.

III. For next week I would like to find out more about the life of Erwin Schrodinger.

AP and SOL testing...

Daniel Miranian
Period-7
Journal 4-7

I was not here on tuesday because of an AP chemistry exam, and on Thursday we did not have class because of the SOL testing schedule.

AP Exams...

Daniel Miranian
Period-7
Journal 4-6

I was not here at all this week because of AP exams.

Magnetism and Electricity

Daniel Miranian
Period-7
Journal 4-5

I. I found out that the standard deviation is the square root of the variance. The equation for standard deviation is σ= ((Σ(x-"x-bar")²)/N)½ . This equation means you take the sum of all of the individual points (x) subtracted by mean value of x (x-bar). Before you do the sum of all of these numbers you have to square each number you get so you get rid of any negative numbers. Then you divide whatever sum you get by the total number of points you have (N). If you stopped here you would get the variance. However, if you take the square root of this you get the standard deviation. Standard deviation is very useful in determining if your data is statistically significant or just random scatter. However, a calculator will easily do the equation for standard deviation for you.

II. Two weeks ago in class we continued to do exercises that highlighted principles of electricity. One day we did a Castle activity that went over which way electricity flowed. We tested this by running a current across a compass. It seemed that when the total power from the battery source was kept constant then the lower the resistance of the wire the more the compass needle would move in relationship to the wire. When we did this in class it seemed like we had a lot of outside interference from other electrical sources such as the computer and possibly the lights. However, we were able to notice a change in the needle of the compass when the wire had a current flowing through it. We also talked about how a capacitor works. I thought this was very interesting. Before this year in physics I had never heard the term capacitor, but I had seen them work before in such things as the flash of a camera.

III. For next week I would like to find out who invented the capacitor and how.