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Basic diagram of an onager, a type of catapult. A catapult is a ballistic device used to launch a projectile a great distance without the aid of gunpowder or other propellants – particularly various types of ancient and medieval siege engines. [1] A catapult uses the sudden release of stored potential energy to propel its payload.
There are various types of potential energy, each associated with a particular type of force. For example, the work of an elastic force is called elastic potential energy; work of the gravitational force is called gravitational potential energy; work of the Coulomb force is called electric potential energy; work of the strong nuclear force or weak nuclear force acting on the baryon charge is ...
For two pairwise interacting point particles, the gravitational potential energy is the work that an outside agent must do in order to quasi-statically bring the masses together (which is therefore, exactly opposite the work done by the gravitational field on the masses): = = where is the displacement vector of the mass, is gravitational force acting on it and denotes scalar product.
The gravitational potential (V) at a location is the gravitational potential energy (U) at that location per unit mass: =, where m is the mass of the object. Potential energy is equal (in magnitude, but negative) to the work done by the gravitational field moving a body to its given position in space from infinity.
The potential has units of energy per mass, e.g., J/kg in the MKS system. By convention, it is always negative where it is defined, and as x tends to infinity, it approaches zero. The gravitational field, and thus the acceleration of a small body in the space around the massive object, is the negative gradient of the gravitational potential ...
The potential energy of an object can be defined as the object's ability to do work and is increased as the object is moved in the opposite direction of the direction of the force. [ nb 1 ] [ 1 ] If F represents the conservative force and x the position, the potential energy of the force between the two positions x 1 and x 2 is defined as the ...
A slingshot or catapult is a small hand-powered projectile weapon. The classic form consists of a Y-shaped frame, with two tubes or strips made from either a natural rubber or synthetic elastic material. These are attached to the upper two ends. The other ends of the strips lead back to a pouch that holds the projectile. One hand holds the ...
A mass driver or electromagnetic catapult is a proposed method of non-rocket spacelaunch which would use a linear motor to accelerate and catapult payloads up to high speeds. Existing and proposed mass drivers use coils of wire energized by electricity to make electromagnets , though a rotary mass driver has also been proposed. [ 1 ]