Hi! Our physics teacher assigned this question. It was notfrom a textbook. It wa

Question

Hi! Our physics teacher assigned this question. It was notfrom a textbook. It was just somethign he wanted us to try: Calculate the speed of the moon with an orbital periodof 30 days. I converted 30 days into seconds: 2592000 seconds. Do I use this equation: GmM/r2=mv2/r    If so I was not sure what numbers to plug in for M and theradius! Thanks!!!! Hi! Our physics teacher assigned this question. It was notfrom a textbook. It was just somethign he wanted us to try: Calculate the speed of the moon with an orbital periodof 30 days. I converted 30 days into seconds: 2592000 seconds. Do I use this equation: GmM/r2=mv2/r    If so I was not sure what numbers to plug in for M and theradius! Thanks!!!! I converted 30 days into seconds: 2592000 seconds. Do I use this equation: GmM/r2=mv2/r    If so I was not sure what numbers to plug in for M and theradius! Thanks!!!!

Explanation / Answer

Oops, meant to clarify, and accidentally deleted my firstresponse. Yes, that's the right equation, which simplifies to v =(GM/r). Assuming you're talking about our moon: M =mass of Earth, r = distance from center of moon to center ofEarth. However, if you want to use exactly 30 days (which is not quite theperiod of our moon, but close), then you may be better off using v= (2r)/T    (which is just circumferencedivided by period) and plugging in the number of seconds thatyou found for T. r would still be as above.

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