Measurement,
Scientific Notation,
Accuracy, and Errors
Annalyn G. Torio
General Physics 1
Learning Competencies:
•Solve measurement problems involving
conversion of units.
•Express measurements in scientific
notation.
•Differentiate accuracy from precision.
•Differentiate random errors from systematic
errors.
Learning Objectives:
•Convert physical quantities to
appropriate SI units.
•Write and interpret values in scientific
notation.
•Distinguish between accurate and
precise measurements.
•Identify types of errors in experiments.
Physics is an experimental science and
it is largely a science of measurement.
Physicists observe the phenomena of
nature and try to find and invent
patterns and principles that relate these
phenomena.
Lord Kelvin
a British physicist, emphasized the importance of
measurement when he said
“when you can measure what you are speaking about
and expressed it in numbers, you know something about
it; but when you cannot express it in numbers, your
knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind; it may
be the beginning of knowledge, but you have scarcely, in
your thoughts, advanced to the stage of science.”
Plato
The Greek philosopher Plato
pointed out that “if arithmetic,
measurement, and weighing is
taken away from any art, that
which remains will not be
much.”
Physics begins with measurement.
Measurement is simply a comparison with
a standard.
To carry out accurate measurements, it is
necessary to establish a system of
standards and a system of units in which to
express the standards
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWHTyibmB7U
NASA Once Lost a $193M Spacecraft Due to a
Simple Math Mistake
PART 1: PHYSICAL QUANTITIES
Standards and Units
Any number that is used to describe a physical
phenomenon quantitatively is called a physical
quantity.
Some physical quantities are so fundamentals that we
can define them only by describing a procedure for
measuring them.
FUNDAMENTAL OR DERIVED
Quantities in physics may either be fundamental or
derived.
Fundamental quantities include length, mass, time,
temperature, electric charge, luminous intensity, and
amount of substance.
Derived quantities are combination of fundamental
quantities.
For example, speed may be described as length of space
travelled divided by time. Other familiar examples of
derived quantities are acceleration, density, work, and
FUNDAMENTAL OR DERIVED
When we measure a quantity, we always compare it with some
reference standards.
When we say that a rope is 20 meters long, we mean that it is 20
times as long as a meter stick, which is defined to be 1 meter long.
We call such a standard a unit of the quantity. The meter is a unit of
distance, and a second is a unit of time. When we use a number to
describe a physical quantity, it is essential to specify the unit we
are using; to describe a distance simply as “20” would have no
meaning
Units have been defined for each fundamental quantity.
These units are called base or fundamental units. The
combination of base units is called a derived unit
SI units and unit conversion
Since 1960 the system of units used by scientists and
engineers is the “metric system”, which is officially
known as the “International System” or SI units
(abbreviation for its French term, Système
International).
To make sure that scientists from different parts of the
world understand the same thing when referring to a
measurement, standards have been defined for
measurements of length, time, and mas
The table below shows the seven
base units of the SI system
Answers in physics problems
are sometimes too small or too
large. For convenience, The
General Conference on Weights
and Measures recommended
the use of prefixes.
The table below is a list of SI
prefixes, symbols and their values
Examples of using prefixes with
units:
kilo- means 1000 times of a meter
Therefore 1 kilometer is 1000 times a meter
milli- means a one thousandth of a meter
Therefore 1 millimetre is 0.001 meter
Unit Conversions
In some of the problems you encounter in this activity,
you may be required to convert one system of unit to
another. Because a single quantity can be expressed in
many different units, it is deemed practical to use a
consistent set of units to avoid confusion. Thus, SI units
are used to express different quantities. Quantities that
are not expressed in SI units are converted for practical
purposes
Conversion of units is done using the factor-label
method with the aid of the conversion table shown
in Table 3.
Study the following examples on converting units
of measurement using the factor-label method.
Example 1: Convert 15 minutes to seconds
Solution:
Step 1: Create the conversion factor(s) using the
conversion table. A conversion factor is a fraction with
the given unit and the unknown unit. If the given unit is
located in the numerator of the given quantity, the
similar unit will be located in the denominator of the
conversion factor, and vice versa.
Hence,
Solution:
Step 1: Create the conversion factor(s) using the
conversion table. A conversion factor is a fraction with
the given unit and the unknown unit. If the given unit is
located in the numerator of the given quantity, the
similar unit will be located in the denominator of the
conversion factor, and vice versa.
Hence,
Example 2: Convert 30 kilometers to meters.
Example 2: Convert 30 kilometers to meters.
• Example 3: A woman drives a car in Tuguegarao at 50
km/h (50 kilometers per hour) express this speed in
meters per second.
Solve measurement problems involving conversion of
units, expression of measurements in scientific
notation (STEM_GP12EU-Ia-1)
Activity 1. CONVERSION OF UNITS
Directions: Convert the following into desired units
2. A can contains 250 mL of juice. How many liters of
juice are there in this can?
Solve measurement problems involving conversion of
units, expression of measurements in scientific
notation (STEM_GP12EU-Ia-1)
3. Filipino men have an average height of 5 ft 1.57
inches. What is the height in centimeters? In meters?
Significant Figures and Scientific
Notation
Significant figures (sig. figs) are those digits in a number
or measurement that are not being used and considered
as place-values.
Zeroes are not significant if they are used only to indicate
the position of the decimal point.
For example, if the length of a computer desk, as
measured by a ruler graduated in millimeters, was found
to be 1564.3mm, the measurement has five significant
figures.
Here are the Rules for Significant
Figures which will help you to
understand them better
1. Nonzero digits are always significant
38.57 mL (4) 288 g (3)
2. Zeroes are sometimes significant, and sometimes they are not.
a. Zeroes at the beginning of a number (used just to position the decimal
point) are never significant. 0.052 g (2) or 5.2X10-2 g 0.00364 m (3) or
3.64x10-3m
b. Zeroes between nonzero digits are always significant. 2007 g (4) 6.08
km (3)
c. c. Zeroes at the end of a number that contains a decimal point are
always significant. 38.0 cm (3) or 38.0x101 cm 440.0 m (4) or
4.400x102 m
d. d. Zeroes at the end of a number that does not contain a decimal point
may or may not be significant. 24,300 km (3, 4, 5)
Here are the Rules for Significant
Figures which will help you to
understand them better
3. Exact numbers can be considered as having an
unlimited number of significant figures. This applies to
defined quantities.
1 yard = 3 ft 1 in. = 2.54 cm (we do not apply sig.
figures)
4. In addition and subtraction, the last digit retained in
the sum or difference is determined by the position of the
first doubtful digit.
Here are the Rules for Significant
Figures which will help you to
understand them better
5. In multiplication and division, an answer contains no
more significant figures than the least number of
significant figures used in the operation.
What is the area of a rectangle 1.23 cm wide and 12.34
cm long?
A = l x w = (12.34 cm)(1.23 cm) = 15.2 cm2
Activity 4. SIGNIFICANT FIGURES
A. Identify how many significant 7. 2.00000 m
figures each given quantity 8. 634.009 L
has
9. 0.0723 g
1. 0.000103 g
10.0.0088x10-5 m
2. 398,000 mL
11.77.83 g + 233.672 g = 311.50
3. 26.7 m g
4. 7.3200x103 g 12.16.2 m – 971.43 m = -955.2 m
5. 43.15 L 13.17.43 g / 3.21 g = 5.43 g
6. 3 gal 14.4qt
15.88.23 cm x 2.796 cm = 246.7
cm2
What is scientific notation?
Scientific notation (also referred to as standard form or
standard index form) is a way of expressing numbers in
decimal form. Scientific notation was developed in order
to easily represent numbers that are either very large or
very small. In this way, very large or very small numbers
can be represented in a much simpler way.
(any number between 1 and 10) x 10n
How to convert a Real or Raw
number into a Scientific Notation?
1. Move the decimal place until you get a number
between one and ten (standard).
2. Count how many places you moved the decimal point.
The number of places would be the exponent of the
‘10’ in the scientific notation. If the decimal point is
moved to the right, then the power of ten would be
negative, and positive if it moved to the left.
The following examples are measurements of mass in
milligram (mg) that are expressed in scientific notation.
1. 45 000 = 4.5 x 104
2. 0.000 075 = 7.5 x 10-5
3. 0.000 251 = 2.51 x 10-4
4. 100 000 = 1 x 105
Accuracy vs. Precision
Accuracy refers to how closely a
measured value agrees with the correct
value. For example, if in lab you obtain a
weight measurement of 3.2 kg for a given
substance, but the actual or known weight
is 10 kg, then your measurement is not
accurate. In this case, your measurement
is not close to the known value.
Accuracy vs. Precision
Precision refers to how closely
individual measurements agree with
one another. For example, if you
weigh a given substance five times,
and get 3.2 kg each time, then your
measurement is very precise.
QUIZ
