Two small spheres are kept at rest in air such that the centre-to-centre separation…

PHYSICS · Multi-part · A Level · Physics · Fields and their consequences · Fields and their consequences

Problem

Two small spheres are kept at rest in air such that the centre-to-centre separation between them is

0.20\,\text{m}

. One sphere has mass

0.50\,\text{kg}

while the other has an unknown mass

m

. The magnitude of the gravitational force of attraction between the two spheres is measured to be

3.34\times10^{-9}\,\text{N}

. (i) Calculate the value of the unknown mass

m

. (ii) Keeping the masses unchanged, determine the gravitational force of attraction when the separation between their centres is increased to

0.40\,\text{m}