Special Physics' Workshop

On 19th March 2016, a workshop on Physics was organised at the Birla Vidya Niketan.

The workshop was attended by chief guest Dr. S.C. Khuntia, MHRD, Government of India and Guest of Honour, Ms. Anita Satia, SCERT. The workshop was conducted by Dr. H.C. Verma, HOD Physics, IIT Kanpur. A long list of achievements is attached to his name. He has conducted nuclear experiments and is the author of books of Physics, now widely used by students. The event started with an inauguration session which included a lighting of the lamp. After introductory speeches by the guests, Dr. Verma went on to give a lecture on ' Matter Waves', a topic which has lately aroused a lot of interest. His lecture was well supported with a presentation and he made it quite interactive by posing several questions to the audience and inviting discussions on points he put across. This was followed by a short tea break. Post tea, students were given demonstrations of some simple scientific concepts, which challenged previously held notions. All the concepts were nicely demonstrated and suitably explained by Dr. Verma. In one experiment, tea leaves and marbles were put in a container with water and stirred for a while. After some time, the marbles settled down near the sides of the container while the tea leaves moved to the centre. Both went in opposite directions, while being in the same medium, as opposed to what we had learnt, that centrifugal force acts outwards. Instead, it was acting on both the bodies, but they were going in different directions. He explained that when using water, the centrifugal force is outwards for both the objects- tea leaves and marbles. Its magnitude depends upon m2r so the centrifugal force was more for the marble than the tea leaves. But there was another force, which everyone failed to analyse. Stirring had created a capillary in the container. From that, there was difference in pressure between the centre and the edges. The edges had high pressure while the centre had low, just like a tornado. The pressure force acted radially inwards. The pressure force dominated in the tea leaves and being lighter, it went inwards, while the marble went outwards due to the dominance of abcentrifugal force and due to its high density. After some experiments, it was time for lunch. Post lunch, the experiments continued, with the students and teachers taking a keen interest and asking questions with enthusiasm. The workshop provided important learning and will surely be of great help whilst training teams at our School. Mr. Pallabh Roy.