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Lab Report 1:

Using the Vernier Lab Pro Interface and the Logger Pro Date
Collection Software














PHYS 261-002
Author: H. Patton
Lab Partners: K. Santos, C. Evans
Date: 12/17/13
Objective: The objective of this lab was to get familiar with the Vernier Lab Pro interface and
the Logger Pro date collection software. The results of the experiment are then analyzed using
Microsoft Excel. To get familiar with the software, a thermometer was used to calculate the
temperature over a certain interval as it relates to Newtons Law of Heating and Cooling. This
data is the data that was analyzed in excel.

Theory: Temperature is the measure of how hot or cold an object or environment is. The device
used to measure temperature is a thermometer. A thermometer uses sensors to detect heat to
provide an accurate temperature. The thermometer must reach a point of equilibrium to provide
an accurate temperature. That is, fluctuations must become steady enough for a stable reading.
When taking a temperature, the temperature of the thermometer, T, changes due to the
temperature of the outside variable, T
o
. Newtons law states that the rate that the heat is
transferred is proportional to temperature difference between the thermometer and the outside
variable. Thus, Newtons law is as follows:
( )
0
T T k
t
T
=
A
A
Eq. (1)
where T/t is the rate of change of the thermometers temperature. This can also be written as
dT/dt which is also known as the derivative of the thermometers temperature with respect to
time. When the temperature of the thermometer and the outside variable are the same, it is
known as thermal equilibrium. The variables measured in this experiment are the outside
temperature, T
o
= T
air
, and the temperature of ones hand, T
o
= T
hand
.

Procedure: To set up the experiment, a digital thermometer was attached to the Vernier Lab Pro
interface which was then connected to a computer that utilized the Logger Pro software. To start
the lab, the setting in Logger Pro were changed so that the thermometer would take the
temperature once per second for 100 seconds, thus taking 100 data points. First, the temperature
of the air was taken for 50 seconds. The consistency of this temperature can be seen in Figure 1.
Next, the temperature of ones hand was taken. This was gone about by taking the temperature
of the air for 10 seconds, then someone grabbed the thermometer and the temperature was taken
for the remainder of the 100 seconds, reaching equilibrium. The temperature rose until the
reaching the temperature of ones hand (see Figure 2). The slope of the graph was taken at
different sections on the graph to show the decreasing temperature change as the thermometer
reached an equilibrium with the hand.


Data: The temperature of the air is shown below in Figure 1. This shows the consistency of the
temperature of the air. The slight slope is from the adjustment of the thermometer to the
temperature of the room.












Figure 1: The temperature of the air as plotted by Logger Pro. The temperature occurs around 27 C.
An average of the temperatures was taken using Logger Pro to get a more firm temperature. This
temperature came out to be 26.90 C.










The temperature of the hand is shown below in Figure 2. Notice the increase of the graph as the
temperature flows from the hand to the thermometer.











Figure 2: The plot of the increasing temperature of the thermometer as it reaches the temperature of the hand.
Plotted in Logger Pro.
The rate of temperature change shows to be greatest when the difference between temperature of
the thermometer and the temperature of the hand (about 35 C according to the graph) is greatest.







Analysis: Below in Table 1 is a sample of the data from when the temperature of the air was
taken.
Sample
Point
Time
(sec)
T (C)
1 9 26.7483566
2 10 26.7947223
3 11 26.8180959
4 12 26.84128
5 13 26.8644646
6 14 26.8876497
7 15 26.9108353
8 16 26.9340215
9 17 26.9572083
10 18 26.9803956
11 19 27.0035834
12 20 27.0267719

The average temperature as calculated by Logger Pro is 26.90 C. This means the T
Air
~ T
Average
.

This can be checked very easily. First, the sum of the temperatures must be calculated. The sum
comes to be 322.767. Next, the sum is divided by the number of sample points, which is 12 in
this case. The average computed is 26.897 C. This number is very close to the average that was
calculated by Logger Pro. Next, the standard deviation was calculated. Standard deviation
shows how far off the temperatures are from the mean. If there is a low standard deviation, then
the temperatures are close to the average temperature. Standard deviation is calculated by taking
the difference of the average temperature and the temperature of the thermometer at each second,
squaring each difference, adding the squares, dividing the sum by one less than the number of
sample points, and finally taking the square root of that number. This agrees with the equation
below:
1
) (
1
2

=

=
N
T T
N
i
o Eq. (2)
where is the standard deviation. The calculation is showed below in Table 2.



Table 1: A sample from the data taken for
the temperature of the air.
Sample
Point time (sec) T (C) T
avg
T-T
avg
(T-T
avg
)
2

1 9 26.7483566 26.89728 -0.14892 0.022178
2 10 26.7947223 26.89728 -0.10256 0.010518
3 11 26.8180959 26.89728 -0.07918 0.00627
4 12 26.84128 26.89728 -0.056 0.003136
5 13 26.8644646 26.89728 -0.03282 0.001077
6 14 26.8876497 26.89728 -0.00963 9.27E-05
7 15 26.9108353 26.89728 0.013555 0.000184
8 16 26.9340215 26.89728 0.036742 0.00135
9 17 26.9572083 26.89728 0.059928 0.003591
10 18 26.9803956 26.89728 0.083116 0.006908
11 19 27.0035834 26.89728 0.106303 0.0113
12 20 27.0267719 26.89728 0.129492 0.016768
sum = 322.767385 sum = 0.083374

avg=sum/n
= 26.8972821 (calc) = 0.08706
Excel avg = 26.8972821 Excel = 0.08706
Table 2: This table shows the calculations of the average and the standard deviation using Eq. (2).
The manual calculations using Eq. (2) are
08706 . 0
11
083374 . 0
= C
The calculation from excel and the manual calculation both agree. With this information, we can
say that the temperature reading is 26.897

0.08706 C.
Next, the data from taking the temperature of the hand was recorded. This data is less constant
than the data taken from the temperature of the air experiment. Thus, this data cannot be
averaged. The mean changes upon different regions that were selected from Figure 2. There
were 6 regions that were taken to show different averages and to determine a rate of temperature
change. The table below shows the slopes and temperature differences with T
hand
and the
average temperature of each region.




T
air
= 29.3 T
hand
= 34.61
Region T
average
(C)
T
hand
- T
average

(C)
T/t
(C/sec)
1 30.19 4.42 0.3673
2 31.9 2.71 0.1981
3 33.69 0.92 0.05721
4 34.13 0.48 0.02872
5 34.4 0.21 0.01437
6 34.61 0 0.03426
Table 3: This table shows the average temperature of each region and the slope of each region.
Next, this data is put into a slope vs. temperature difference scatter plot in Excel to determine if it
Newtons Law of heating holds. This data should make an approximate straight line. This is
shown below in Figure 3.

Figure 3: This figure plots slope vs. temperature difference. The magnitude of slope and temperature difference are
directly proportional. The slope of the trendline from Excel is 0.0792 and the value of R is 0.9789, which shows a
clear linear trend.
Since the data above shows an approximate straight line, this shows that Newtons Law of
Heating is satisfied.

y = 0.0792x + 0.0012
R = 0.9789
0
0.05
0.1
0.15
0.2
0.25
0.3
0.35
0.4
0 1 2 3 4 5
S
l
o
p
e

(

C
/
s
e
c
)

Temperature Difference (C)
Slope vs. Temperature Difference
Slope vs. Temperature
Difference
Linear (Slope vs. Temperature
Difference)
Conclusion: Overall, this experiment was very successful. The temperature of the air was
shown to be roughly constant over a 50 second interval. This temperature was not exactly
constant due to fluctuations of temperature of the air or because the thermometer was to close to
the lab participants. This is shown by the standard deviation of 0.08706. A better measurement
would be to use multiple thermometers. This would test the validity of each thermometer.
The temperature of the hand experiment was successful also. This temperature was shown to
increase over a period of time, and the rate of increase seemed to be constant, as shown in
Newtons Law of Heating. The data in the Figure 3 did not form a perfect straight line. This
could be caused by fluctuations of the thermometer as it was adjusting to temperature. Any other
fluctuations can be caused movement of the participants hand during the temperature reading.

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