A tennis player hits a 0.1-kilogram tennis ball with her racket from the north end of a court. Her racket was traveling at 65 kilometers per hour. The ball accelerated at a rate of 10 meters per second squared. 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?

Question

A tennis player hits a 0.1-kilogram tennis ball with her racket from the north end of a court. Her racket was traveling at 65 kilometers per hour. The ball accelerated at a rate of 10 meters per second squared. 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. 6.5 N
2. 1 N
3. 0.01 N
4. 7.5 N

GPT-4o mini · Answer

To find the force that the floor exerts 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, and \( a \) is the acceleration.

In this case:

The mass \( m \) of the tennis ball is \( 0.1 \) kilograms.
The acceleration \( a \) that the ball experiences when it hits the floor and is propelled towards the tennis player's opponent is \( 10 \) meters per second squared.

Now, substituting the values into the equation:

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

Calculating this gives:

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

Therefore, the force that the floor on the south end of the court exerted on the ball is 1 N.

So the correct answer is:

2. 1 N