Acceleration
- Acceleration is a vector representing how fast, and in what direction, something's velocity is changing.
- Acceleration is related to velocity the same way velocity is related to position.
Acceleration is the rate of change of velocity.
| Average acceleration: aav |
= |
| Dv
|  |
| Dt
|
|
= |
| vf - vi
| |
| tf - ti
|
|
| Instantaneous acceleration: a
|
= |
| dv
| |
| dt
|
|
If the acceleration is constant the instantaneous acceleration is equal to the average acceleration.
The instantaneous acceleration is the slope of the line on a velocity-versus-time graph.
The change in velocity Dv
is the area under the curve of the acceleration-versus-time graph.