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LessonGrades 9 - 12

Archimedes' Principle, Pascal's Law and Bernoulli's Principle

Students are introduced to Pascal's law, Archimedes' principle and Bernoulli's principle. Fundamental definitions, equations, practice problems and engineering applications are supplied. Students can use the associated activities to strengthen their understanding of relationships between the previous concepts and real-life examples. A PowerPoint® presentation, practice problems and grading rubric are provided.

A schematic cut-away side-view drawing of a hydraulic system shows a reservoir with an intake pipe departing from the reservoir bottom, illustrating Bernoulli's principle and Pascal's law. A powerhouse with a generator and a turbine demonstrates Pascal's law. Water is discharged to a river, demonstrating Bernoulli's principle and flow. The elevation difference between the reservoir water surface and the (lower) river water surface is identified as hydraulic head.Engineers design hydraulic systems by applying their understanding of Bernoulli's principle and Pascal's law.

The concepts of Pascal's law, Archimedes' principle and Bernoulli's principle are important in engineering and technology applications, including aerodynamics and hydrodynamics, hydraulics, floating vessels, submersibles, airplanes, automobiles, aerospace guidance and control, pipelines and transport systems, as well as for many modern research topics such as ocean-related flows, turbulence, reacting flows, global climate, bio-fluid mechanics, flow over magnetic tapes and disks, geophysical flows, kinetics of combustion systems, and vortex dynamics.

After this lesson, students should be able to:

  • Use Archimedes' principle to determine buoyancy forces.
  • Solve problems involving pressure, density and Pascal's law.
  • Solve problems using the Bernoulli equation and the continuity equation.
  • Explain situations involving the Bernoulli Effect.

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