Newton's Second Law of Motion

“The acceleration of an object depends on the mass of the object and the amount of force applied.”

When an object at rest is pushed to gain speed. The velocity of the object increases from zero to a non-zero value. This will take a given amount of time. This whole process is called acceleration. During acceleration an object gains momentum. Momentum is the product of the mass and the velocity of an object.

You might be able to move a real car quite slowly by pushing on it with the maximum force you can give. But if you push a toy car with the same force, it will move quite fast. This is because a real car has a greater mass than a toy car. This shows that the acceleration of an object being pushed is higher when the mass is lower. Also, you have to push both the cars with greater force for it to move faster. This shows that the acceleration of an object being pushed is higher when the force acting on it is higher.

Newton’s second law can be expressed as an equation:

F = ma (F:Force, m:mass, and a:acceleration)