Physics Demonstrations

Welcome to the Auburn University physics demonstration site. The primary purpose of these pages is to assist the faculty and students of Auburn University in introductory physics courses more advanced physics courses with their demonstration needs.

Physics is an experimental subject, and literally studies phenomena all around you. Demonstrations give students a visual feel for the concept at hand, which they can refer back to during problem solving. Doing them correctly is critical for this learning aspect.

We will be posting videos of the demonstrations here soon. These will go over the actual procedure, but also how to use the demo for maximum learning impact to the students, including clickers, predictions, performance, results. (These are called ILD - Interactive Lecture Demonstrations - see link below.)

Please note that as we modernize the demonstrations, there may be some mismatch between availability of ancient demos mentioned here and their modern counterparts. (e.g. no longer will you blow into a 40-year-old metal tube to "shoot the monkey" - we have a photogate-based magnetic version now.)

For demo requests, please email kolarkar@auburn.edu preferably 24-48 hours before your need for the demo.

 

New Demos for 2019

INTERACTIVE LECTURE DEMONSTRATION PROCEDURE

EXPLANATION OF PIRA NUMBERING SYSTEM

NAME THAT DEMONSTRATION

  

MAIN CATEGORIES OF PHYSICS DEMONSTRATIONS

Click on a category to bring up next menu.

 

hammer.jpg MECHANICS (1)

waterfall.jpg FLUIDS (2)

newwave.jpgWAVES AND RESONANCE (3)

thermmeter.jpgTHERMODYNAMICS (4)

nssl0010.jpgELECTRICITY AND MAGNETISM (5)

magscop3.jpgOPTICS (6)

!7d10_80.jpgMODERN PHYSICS (7)

galaxy2.jpg ASTRONOMY (8)

 
This site was first created in the 90's by James Clark. From 2001 - 2016 it has been maintained and expanded by Dr. William Maddox. Current maintainer - kolarkar.