Crack! Clunk! Physicists--and players--tune in to the sounds of baseball. (Physics: acoustics).STAR HITTER Barry Bonds Barry Lamar Bonds (born July 24 1964 in Riverside, California) is a left fielder for the San Francisco Giants of Major League Baseball. He is the son of former major league All-Star Bobby Bonds, the godson of Hall of Famer Willie Mays, and a distant cousin of Hall of Famer Reggie of the San Francisco Giants The San Francisco Giants are a Major League Baseball team based in San Francisco, California that currently play in the National League West Division. New York Giants history Early days and the John McGraw era steps up to the plate, cocks his bat, takes a monster swing, and CRACK! By sound alone, the fans know Bonds has slammed another homer. And so does Baltimore Orioles This article is about the contemporary American major league baseball team. For other uses, see Baltimore Oriole (disambiguation). The Baltimore Orioles are a professional baseball team based in Baltimore, Maryland. outfielder Melvin Mora Melvin Mora (born February 2, 1972 in Agua Negra, Yaracuý State, Venezuela), affectionately nicknamed Melmo or Melvy, is a Major League Baseball Third Baseman for the Baltimore Orioles. He bats and throws right-handed. . "As soon as I hear the sound of the bat, I know where the ball is going," Mora MORA, In civil law. This term, in mora, is used to denote that a party to a contract, who is obliged to do anything, has neglected to perform it, and is in default. Story on Bailm. Sec. 123, 259; Jones on Bailm. 70; Poth. Pret a Usage, c. 2, Sec. 2, art. 2, n. says. A dull thud and he scrambles in; a sharp pop and Mora pedals back. Sound can improve a player's reaction time by about one-twentieth of a second, or one step. In the world of pro ball, that can mean the difference between making a catch or coming up short. "It's something I can't explain," Mora says. But Yale physicist Robert Adair This article is about the British politician. For the Irish cricketer of the same name, see Robert Adair (cricketer) Sir Robert Adair (1763 – 1855) was a distinguished English diplomatist, and frequently employed on the most important diplomatic missions. can--he's a diehard baseball fan and an expert in baseball acoustics, the scientific study of sound. During his reign as physicist to the National League, Adair investigated the physics of noisy bat-on-ball collisions. His findings? Two basic sounds occur when a bat clobbers a ball. If a slugger connects squarely with a pitch, a "crack" sound is produced by air exploding out between the ball and the bat, explains Adair. That sudden explosion causes surrounding air molecules to pulsate pul·sate v. To expand and contract rhythmically; beat. outward like ocean waves until they reach your ears, which then translate the waves into an electrical message interpreted by your brain. "If you don't hit the ball squarely you hear the bat vibrate," says Adair. "That produces a thudlike sound that gives an experienced player a clue that the ball hasn't been hit too well." Much like strings on a tennis racket or guitar, most points along a bat will vibrate when struck. The vibrations move in waves up and down the bat, and pass into the batter's hands, where they cause a painful sting--and drain energy away from the ball. How do you avoid bat vibes? "Hit the sweet spot," Adair says. "That's a place on the bat--about 7 or 8 inches away from its end--where you have minimum vibration." A typical wooden bat has one major "sweet spot" called a node, a place where waves cancel one another out--and mute vibrations. So when a ball smacks a node, more energy is transferred to the ball, less winds up in your palms, and you hear the telltale crack of a likely homer. Can any sound be sweeter? Did You Know? * An average professional pitcher hurls a fastball over the plate in less than a half second! According to Newton's second law of motion Noun 1. Newton's second law of motion - the rate of change of momentum is proportional to the imposed force and goes in the direction of the force Newton's second law, second law of motion , the ball's acceleration depends on two variables: its mass and the amount of force acting on it. Using the equation a = F/m (a = acceleration; F = force; m = mass), you can see that the magnitude of a bali's acceleration is inversely proportional to its mass: the lighter the ball, the greater its acceleration. * Newton's third law of motion Noun 1. Newton's third law of motion - action and reaction are equal and opposite law of action and reaction, Newton's third law, third law of motion law of motion, Newton's law, Newton's law of motion - one of three basic laws of classical mechanics comes into play when a ball collides with the bat. The law states that forces occur in pairs: when two objects crash into each other they experience an equal and opposite force, although the lighter object will experience a greater acceleration. You can calculate the difference between the two objects' acceleration by applying the equation a = F/m to each object. Cross-Curricular Connection History: Science and sports go hand-in-hand. Research and report on three scientific advances in baseball. CHECK FOR UNDERSTANDING Directions: Complete the puzzle by answering the questions below. 1. Helicopter blade shape that's curved on top and flat on the bottom--. 2. Magnetic field: area around a magnet that exerts a pushing or pulling--. 3. Rate at which waves travels from one crest to another in one second:--. 4. The answer in number three is measured in--. 5. Particles of energy that pulsates through space and matter:-- 6. The scientific study of sound:-- 7. Baseball bat's sweet spot:-- 8. The sound a bat makes when ball hits the sweet spot:-- 9. The sound a bat makes when ball doesn't hit the sweet spot:-- 10. It takes an outfielder typically 1.-- (spell out) seconds to judge if a hit is a blooper or a blast. 11. Melvin Mora's team:-- 12. Home city of Barry Bond's team.-- ANSWERS 1. airfoil 2. force 3. frequency 4. hertz 6. radio waves Radio waves Electromagnetic energy of the frequency range corresponding to that used in radio communications, usually 10,000 cycles per second to 300 billion cycles per second. 6. acoustics 7. node 8. crack O. clunk 10. five 11. Orioles 12. San Francisco National Science Education Standards The National Science Education Standards (NSES) are a set of guidelines for the science education in primary and secondary schools in the United States, as established by the National Research Council in 1996. Grades 5-8: form and function * motions and forces * transfer of energy Grades 9-12: form and function * structure and properties of matter * motions and forces * interactions of energy and matter Resources Physics of Baseball by Robert Adair, Harper Collins, 2002. "The Crack of the Bat: Acoustics Takes On the Sounds of Baseball," by James Glanz, The New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of Times, June 26, 2001 For more on the science of baseball, visit the Exploratorium Museum Web site:www.exploratorium.edu/baseball/ |
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