Potential energy

Potential energy is energy that is stored in an object. An example is gravitational potential energy such as that of a roller coaster train at the peak of its lift hill.

The formula for gravitational potential energy for two point masses is:

$V=-{\frac {GMm}{r}}$

where

$G$ is Newton's gravitational constant

$M$ and Failed to parse (MathML with SVG or PNG fallback (recommended for modern browsers and accessibility tools): Invalid response ("Math extension cannot connect to Restbase.") from server "https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/":): {\displaystyle m} are the masses of the two particles

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If one particle moves a radial distance (towards or away) from the other a distance $\Delta h$ and $\Delta h\ll r$, then the change in potential $\Delta E$ can be approximated by

$\Delta E=mg\,\Delta h$

where $g$ is the gravitational field strength in the vicinity of the initial and final points.

See also

• Kinetic Energy