What is it about?
This short Letter to the Editor shows how dimensional analysis - matching up units - allows us to make useful predictions, specifically how the Mars Ingenuity helicopter flies on Mars compared to on Earth, using the ratios of atmospheric density and gravity on each.
Featured Image
Photo by Planet Volumes on Unsplash
Why is it important?
Ingenuity's first test flight on Mars (the first of many as it turned out) was a Wright Brothers' moment in planetary exploration. While the details of its rotor design, weight, power consumption etc. are complicated, there are still aspects than can be understood and calculated using introductory physics concepts.
Perspectives
My hope is to engage and inspire physics teachers and the next generation of explorers they are teaching, with a simple but powerful illustration of how we can use dimensional analysis to scale Earth-tested properties to other worlds, with some simple assumptions. The calculations worked out great! (There is also an online supplement with more details.)
Dr. Philip Blanco
Grossmont College
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Rotorcraft RPM on Mars, The Physics Teacher, September 2021, American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT),
DOI: 10.1119/10.0006112.
You can read the full text:
Contributors
The following have contributed to this page
