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Work Energy Theorem

Student 5051 9 years ago updated by Physics Tutorial Center Staff 9 years ago 1

Suppose that you have a mass m and you run up the flight of stairs of height h from height L. I need to know how much energy was used by the time I reach the top. However, I used the work energy theorem and my answer was simply W=mgh. Apparently, that is wrong. Why?

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The change in gravitational potential energy is mg(L-h).That means this is the minimum mechanical energy it would take. In reality, takes us more than this because our bodies are not perfectly efficient at using energy.


Hope this helps!