Newton's Laws of Motion

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Newton Laws of Motion

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A set of three fundamental postulates forming the basis of the mechanics of rigid bodies, formulated by Newton in 1687. </dd>
The first law is concerned with the principle of inertia and states that if a body in motion is not acted upon by an external force, its momentum remains constant (law of conservation of momentum). The second law asserts that the rate of change of momentum of a body and is in the direction of the applied force. A familiar statement of this is the equation F = ma where F is vector sum of the applied forces, m is the mass, and a is the vector acceleration of the body. The third law is the principle of action and reaction, stating that for every force acting upon a body there exists a corresponding force of the same magnitude exerted by the body in the opposite direction. </dd>

References

This article is based on NASA's Dictionary of Technical Terms for Aerospace Use