A tennis player hits a 0.1-kilogram tennis ball with her racket from the north end of a court. Her recket was traveling at 65 kilometers per hour. The ball accelerated at a rate of 10 meters per second square. The Ball hits the floor on the south end of the tennis court. The floor sends the Ball toward the tennis player's opponent with the same acceleration. How much force did the floor on the south end of the court exert on the Ball?

1 answer

To find the force exerted by the floor on the tennis ball, we can use Newton's second law of motion, which states that:

\[ F = m \cdot a \]

where:

  • \( F \) is the force,
  • \( m \) is the mass of the object,
  • \( a \) is the acceleration of the object.

Given:

  • The mass of the tennis ball \( m = 0.1 \) kg,
  • The acceleration \( a = 10 \) m/s² (the same as the ball’s acceleration toward the opponent).

Substituting the values into the formula:

\[ F = 0.1 , \text{kg} \times 10 , \text{m/s}² \]

Calculating this gives:

\[ F = 1 , \text{N} \]

So, the force exerted by the floor on the ball is 1 Newton.