I’m studying about pressure right now, and I’m wondering about this
In: Physics
On the surface, they only thing pushing down on us is the atmosphere above us.
In the Mariana Trench, we’ve got the atmosphere pushing down on us as well as miles of ocean. And water is much more dense than air, so that water is pushing down on us much harder.
Pressure is essentially the force you get on a surface. Think of a bicycle tyre. When there is no air in it the tyre is flat and soft. Adding more air increases the pressure (the pushing force) on the inside of the tyre and makes it more rigid.
As there is more air particles in the same volume, the air is more dense. Density effects pressure.
As you go deeper down into water, the water is being compressed more by the weight of the particles above them. Its like being crushed by objects. The more objects above you, the more weight you feel.
The water at the bottom of the ocean is being crushed by the water above and causing it to be more dense as you go deeper.
As you probably know pressure is the force applied on an area. Since the area of an object stays the same as it goes deeper, the crushing force increases. Therefore higher pressure.
It will also help to know that gasses and liquids create a pushing force on an object because the particles are repelling off of each other. If the gas or liquid is more dense, the repelling force is higher. A bit like magnets when the same poles are pushed together. The closer they are, the stronger the force. That’s why density affects pressure.
Imagine that all of the air above your head is a big old column. It pushes down on your head, crushing you with around 15 pounds for every square inch.
That’s a fair amount of air.
Now you go underwater. All of the water above your head is now added to this column; a lot of weight, all crushing down on you.
The closer to the center of the earth you get, the more “stuff” (matter) is above and around you. All of this “stuff” has weight to it, so the more of it there is around you, more weight is being pushed onto you.
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