Question

Define elastic and inelastic collisions. What are their basic characteristics?

Answer 1

Hint: In physics, we know that when two bodies suddenly come in contact with significantly velocities they collide with each other and in result both bodies change their state of motion depending upon the types of collision. Mainly they are of two types: elastic and inelastic collision.

Complete answer:
Let us first understand elastic collision. In physics, elastic collision is when two bodies collide with each other then there is no loss of kinetic energy between them compared to their initial and final kinetic energies. And the momentum remains conserved.

Characteristics of elastic collision:
-Initial kinetic energy is equal to the final kinetic energy of the system during collision hence, there is no loss of Kinetic energy.
-Initial momentum is equal to the final momentum of the system and follows the law of conservation of linear momentum.
-Inelastic collision may be defined as, when two bodies collide and their linear momentum remains conserved but the final Kinetic energy is less than that of initial kinetic energy.

Characteristics of Inelastic collision:
-Initial momentum is equal to the final momentum of the system and follows the law of conservation of linear momentum.
-Final Kinetic energy is less than that of the initial one and hence, there’s a loss of Kinetic energy during the collision.

Note: Remember that, during inelastic collision there’s a loss of kinetic energy but one may think that total energy of a system always remains constant so answer is that some part of energy is lost in environment as heat or sound energy hence following the law of conservation of energy.