IB Physics C1 Notes

This page contains our IB Physics notes for C1. By reading each one of these notes, you will fully cover the content for IB Physics 'Further simple harmonics'.

All Topic 3 Sub-topics

C1: Simple Harmonics

(HL)C1: Further simple harmonics

C2: Wave Models

C3: Wave Phenomena

(HL)C3: Further wave phenomena

C4: Standing Waves & Resonance

C5: Doppler Effect

(HL)C5: Further Doppler effects

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SHM formulae

You need to be able to quantify the displacement, velocity, and acceleration and the energies. To fully understand how this occurs, let's first review how these are related. Remember that the phase difference between displacement and velocity is 90°, velocity and acceleration is 90°, and displacement and acceleration is 180° as shown below:

Since simple harmonic motion is sinusoidal motion, an alternative way to describe the displacement, velocity, and acceleration is via trigonometric functions. The basic format of these is:

a sin bx
a cos bx

Here, a is amplitude and b is the period coefficient, whose corresponding values are shown below:

	Amplitude (a)	Period coefficient (b)
Displacement (x)	maximum displacement (x₀)	angular frequency (ω)
Velocity (v)	maximum velocity (v₀) = ωx₀	angular frequency (ω)
Acceleration (a)	maximum acceleration (a₀) = ω² x₀	angular frequency (ω)

Substituting in these values, the formulae we get are:

	No displacement at t = 0	Positive displacement at t = 0
Displacement (x)	$x = x_{0} sin \omega t$		$x = x_{0} cos \omega t$
Velocity (v)	$v = -\omega x_{0} cos \omega t$	$v = -\omega x_{0} sin \omega t$
Acceleration (a)	$a = - \omega^{2} x_{0} sin \omega t$		$a = - \omega^{2} x_{0} cos \omega t$

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