Motion, Velocity, Acceleration “flying around—part 2”
Flying Around Recall that if we have a friendly fly buzzing around the room, we describe its motion using parametric equations. What about its velocity and acceleration?
Velocity The velocity of the fly is a vector whose magnitude is the fly’s speed and which points in the direction of motion of the fly. It is tangent to the fly’s path when its base is placed at the fly’s position.
Velocity The velocity of the fly is a vector whose magnitude is the fly’s speed and which points in the direction of motion of the fly. It is tangent to the fly’s path when its base is placed at the fly’s position. If the position is given by , then the velocity is given by
Acceleration Likewise the acceleration of the fly is defined to be: What can we say about the direction of the acceleration of the fly with respect to the trajectory? This is more complicated than the direction of the velocity vector, as we shall see with some examples.