Question

Give the name of the physical quantity that corresponds to the shortest distance between the initial and the final position of a moving body?

Answer 1

displacement is the shortest distance between initail and final points

Answer 2

Explanation:

The physical quantity which corresponds to shortest distance between the “initial and the final position” of a ‘moving body’ is defined as displacement. It is a ‘vector quantity’ and is the travelled distance by the object between two points. Being a vector quantity, displacement is constituted by both the direction of the movement of the object and its magnitude.  

Displacement D = Final position (f)- initial position (I) = gives the change in position.

Displacement is denoted by the symbol $\Delta$ and is calculated using the formula:

$Displacement (D) =\mathrm{X}_{\mathrm{f}}-\mathrm{X}_{\mathrm{i}}=\Delta \mathrm{X}$

The ‘SI unit’ for “displacement is meter” (m)