Thermal Expansion

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Recommended: Explain the consequences of thermal expansion

Have you ever wondered why the air in your tires fluctuates from season to season? Living in Oklahoma, the weather can be 60 degrees Fahrenheit one day and 15 degrees the next day. The air in our tires expand and contracts depending on the temperature of the air inside them. Changes in temperature not only affect the air in our tires, but also many aspects of life. These fluctuations give rise to thermal expansion.
Thermal expansion is the tendency of matter to change in volume in response to a change in temperature. One may never know it, but thermal expansion occurs in many forms of our everyday life. In scientific terms, heat is internal energy that flows from a system of relatively high temperature to one at a relatively low temperature. The internal energy itself, identified as thermal energy, is what people commonly mean when they say "heat." A form of kinetic energy due to the movement of molecules, thermal energy is sometimes called molecular translational energy. (Thermal Expansion)
Thermal expansion is calculated by using a coefficient to determine how materials will react to changes in temperatures. The coefficient is a number that serves as a measure for some characteristic or property. It may also be a factor against which other values are multiplied to provide a desired result. For any type of material, it is possible to calculate the degree to which that material will expand or contract when exposed to changes in temperature. This is known, in general terms, as its coefficient of expansion, though, in fact, there are two varieties of expansion coefficient. The coefficient of linear expansion is a constant that governs the degree to which the length of a solid will change as a result of an alteration in temperature ...

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...nd occupy its given space. A great example is carbonation in a bottle of coke. When the coke is cold, the amount of carbonation that is lost when the cap is open is less than what would be lost if a person were to open the coke bottle while the pop was hot, Since the particles of air would be more greatly dispersed, the pop would become flat quicker. There is a direct relationship between volume and temperature. As a gas heats up, its volume increases, and when it cools down, its volume reduces.
Thermal expansion plays a huge part in our lives. From the way buildings are constructed to opening a hot bottle of pop, thermal expansion is a force acting upon many different things that for the most part we seldom think about. The next time you consider removing a hot radiator cap or even decide to take a hot air balloon ride, take the time to appreciate thermal expansion

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