Heat energy possesses the ability to be transferred from one object to another through three main ways
Heat energy possesses the ability to be transferred from one object to another through three main ways. One being conduction, which is the direct heat transfer between atom collision, where heat spreads through high-speed vibrating particles bumping against slower-moving cooler particles, making them speed up and ultimately warm up. The cycle continues and eventually the energy is spread throughout, where all molecules are vibrating. Thus, because they have increased energy, they have heat energy, making the object increase in warmth. Another way for heat transfer to occur is convection, which is a cycle that takes place when a fluid is heated, where molecules that get heated up become less dense and rise, where it eventually grows cold and sinks when it is away from the heat source. The last of one of the main transferences of heat is radiation. Radiation can be defined as the transmission of energy from a body in the form of waves or particles (Howard, 2018). When light rays hit a certain object, either reflection, transmission or absorption of light waves occur because the frequencies of the light waves do not match the natural frequencies of vibrations within the objects. When light waves of these frequencies strike an object, the electrons in the atoms of the item begins vibrating. However, instead of vibrating in resonance at a large amplitude, the electrons vibrate for brief periods of time with small amplitudes of vibration, then the energy is reemitted as a light wave, whether through or reflected back. Transmission occurs if the object is transparent, where the vibrations of the electrons are passed on to neighbouring atoms and reemitted on the opposite side of the object. Reflection occurs when the object is opaque, and the vibrations of the electrons are not passed from atom to atom through the material, but the electrons of atoms on the material’s surface vibrate for a short period of time before the energy is reemitted as a reflected light wave. Absorption occurs when electrons of atoms have a natural frequency at which they will vibrate, so when a light wave with the same natural frequency strikes an atom, it will vibrate. If a light wave of a certain frequency strikes a material with electrons of the same vibrational frequencies, then they will energy of the light wave will be absorbed and transformed into a vibrating motion. As they are vibrating, they will collide with neighbouring atoms and as a result, create and spread heat energy (Physicsclassroom.com, 2018). However, not everything has the same vibration frequencies, so different frequencies of light from the visible light spectrum will be absorbed. The term thermal insulation is most commonly used to describe the process that is used to keep something at a stable temperature (Misapor.ch, 2018). The opposite, thermal conduction is the heat within a body is transferred when two objects are directly in contact.
