Selection Test 4

23 March, 2013
Total: 100 marks (20 marks for each question), Time allowed: 180 minutes

Answer all questions.

1. As shown in the figure, the string is fixed to the wall at position x = 0. At the other
end where x = L, the string is attached to two springs that are free to move in the
vertically upward and downward directions. The force constant of each spring is k0.
Let T be the tension in the string and  be the mass per unit length of the string.
(a) Consider the transverse wave motion of small amplitudes along the string. At
position x and time t, the transverse displacement is denoted as y(x, t), and the slope of
the string is denoted as s(x, t) (mathematically, s(x, t) = y/x). What is the ratio s(x,
t)/y(x, t) at the position x = L?
(b) Consider the standing waves of the string. What condition has to be satisfied by
the wavenumber k?
(c) What are the frequencies of the nth harmonic of the standing waves when k0
approaches 0?
(d) The tension T of the string is adjusted such that the fundamental frequency of the
standing wave satisfies k = 3/4L. What is the value of T?
(e) Consider a traveling wave incident at the end x = L. The frequency of the traveling
wave is adjusted such that k = 2k0/T. What is the phase shift of the reflected wave?

k0

y(x, t)
k0

x=0
x=L

2. Consider a solar system immersed in a uniformly dense dark matter. Then objects
of mass m in the solar system would experience both the gravitational force and the
attraction of the dark matter, given by

mk
Fr    mbr .
r2

Assume that the extra force due to dark matter is very small, that is, b << k/r3.
(a) Consider a circular orbit of radius r0. What is the corresponding angular
momentum per unit mass l?
(b) Write the expression for the angular velocity of the circular orbit with angular
momentum L = ml.
(c) Find the period of the radial oscillations (徑向振動) for a nearly circular orbit, and
the rate of precession (進動) of the perihelion (近日點) of this orbit.
(d) Describe the shapes of the orbits when r is large enough so that Fr  br.

1
3. When a temperature gradient (溫度梯度) is applied to a gas, there will be a heat
flux (熱通量). The thermal conductivity (熱傳導率)  of the gas is defined by the
equation

dT
Q   ,
dx

where Q is the heat flux in the x direction, that is, the net amount of internal energy of
the gas transported per unit time per unit area in the x direction. dT/dx is the
temperature gradient. At equilibrium, the temperature gradient is constant and
independent of x. Let  be the average time between successive collisions of a gas
molecule with other molecules. Assume that the gas is ideal and monatomic, m is the
mass of a molecule, and k is the Boltzmann constant.
(a) Suppose the temperature of the gas at position x is T. What is the temperature of
the gas at position x + x?
(b) An incident (入射的) molecule arrives at position x. The x component of its
velocity is vx. What is x of the position where the molecule experiences the collision
last time?
(c) What is the average kinetic energy of the gas molecules according to the kinetic
theory of gases?
(d) Compared with the average in (c), what is the average extra kinetic energy carried
by the incident molecule of a given vx when it arrives at position x?
(e) The gas contains n molecules per unit volume. What is the heat flux Q in the x
direction according to the kinetic theory of gases? Hence find an approximate
expression for the thermal conductivity.

4. As shown in the figure, a beam of ion has a radius r. Each ion has a charge q, mass
m, and velocity v. The charge density may be assumed to be constant throughout the
cross-section of the beam, so that the beam generates a constant current I.
(a) Calculate the electrostatic force Fe acting on an ion at the periphery (邊緣) of the
ion beam.
(b) Calculate the magnetic force Fm acting on an ion at the periphery of the ion beam.
(c) Calculate the net outward force acting on an ion at the periphery of the ion beam.
(d) Assuming that the expressions in (a-c) are valid even in the relativistic limit,
calculate the ratio of the net force to the electrostatic force when the kinetic energy of
the ion is equal to its rest energy.
(e) Consider an electron beam passing through a nearly perfect vacuum. If the electron
beam ionizes the small amount of residual (殘留) gas molecules near the beam center,
how will the radius of the electron beam change?

v
r

2
5. As shown in the figure, a wheel consists of a large number of thin conducting
spokes (輪輻) and is free to rotate about an axle (輪軸). A brush always makes
electrical contact with one spoke at a time at the bottom of the wheel. A battery with
voltage V feeds current through an inductor, into the axle, through the spoke, to the
brush. A permanent magnet provides a uniform magnetic field B into the plane of the
paper. The radius and moment of inertia of the wheel are R and J respectively. The
total inductance of the current path is L, and the wheel is initially at rest. Neglecting
friction and resistivity, and assuming that the wheel is initially at rest, calculate the
angular velocity of the wheel and the battery current as functions of time after the
circuit is switched on.

V
Brush

Switch

THE END