Homework #2
Newton's Universal Law of Gravitation: Gravitational Potential Energy
You want to leave Earth to reach the International Space Station. The radius of planet Earth is approximately 6.378x10^6(m), while the ISS orbits the Earth an average of 4.1x10^6(m) above the surface. The mass of Earth is approximately 5.972x10^24(kg), and the mass of your spaceship is approximately 1.3x10^5(kg). The gravitational constant, which represents the quality of our universe to facilitate interactions between massive objects, is approximately 6.67x10^-11((N*(m^2))/(kg^2)).
(1) Draw a labeled illustration of the situation, including labels for the objects involved .
(2) Separately from your illustration, create a force diagram with labels for each force vector identifying what objects are interacting with the system. The system is the Spaceship. Additionally.
(3) Add an arrow to your illustration representing the displacement of the spaceship, use this as evidence to explain how you know if energy is added or removed from the system during this process.
(4) Create an Energy Bar Chart representing this process, for the system of the spaceship and Earth, from the time right before launch until the spaceship docks with the ISS.
(5) Begin with Newton's Universal Law of Gravitation for Gravitational Potential Energy and our model for Work as an algebraic expression, estimate the energy needed to get to the spaceship to the ISS, show all work including units.
