A system consists of interacting objects A and B, each exerting a constant 3.0 N pull on the other. What is (delta)U for the system if A moves 1.0 m toward B while B moves 2.0 m toward A?

Video transcript

Welcome back, everyone. We are making observations about two separate particles here. X and Y you're told that each particle exerts a constant force on one another of 20 newtons. And we are told that if X moves two centimeters or 20.2 m closer to Y while Y moves four centimeters or point oh four m closer to X, that we will witness a, a change in potential energy here. And we are tasked with finding what is that potential energy? Well, we know that our change of potential energy here is just going to be the negative of the summation of the work done by each individual particle on one another. So what is this equal to? Well, this is just equal to the negative of the force of Y exerted on X times the X plus the force of oh my apologies, force of X exerted on Y times D X plus the force of Y exerted on X D Y. But here's the thing we're told that the force exerted on one another is equal and that it is 20 newtons. So what this is really equal to is negative force times D X plus D Y, we have all of the values. So let's just go ahead and plug them in. We have that our potential energy is equal to negative times point oh two plus point oh four, which is point oh six. When you plug this into your calculator, you get negative 1.2 Jews corresponding to our final answer. Choice of B Thank you all so much for watching. Hope this video helped see you all in the next one.