2. A student wanted to investigate changing the mass of a cart that you can push. The student pushed both carts with a force of 200 Newtons. If one cart has a mass of 100kg and the other cart a mass of 50kg, what results would the student expect to see as far as how fast each cart moved in comparison with one another?
Based on Newton's second law (F = ma), the acceleration of an object is directly proportional to the force applied on it and inversely proportional to its mass.
The force applied by the student (200 Newtons) is the same for both carts.
For the cart with a mass of 100kg, the acceleration can be calculated as:
a = F / m = 200 N / 100 kg = 2 m/s^2
For the cart with a mass of 50kg, the acceleration can be calculated as:
a = F / m = 200 N / 50 kg = 4 m/s^2
Therefore, the cart with a mass of 50kg would accelerate faster and move faster compared to the cart with a mass of 100kg.