Edexcel A-level Physics

What is included

What this course covers

• Topic 1 — Working as a Physicist

  • 1.1 – Base and derived quantities, SI units, and estimating physical quantities
  • 1.2 – Practical skills and techniques
  • 1.3 – The limitations of physical measurement
  • 1.4 – Communicating physics, and science, society, benefits and risks

• Topic 2 — Mechanics

  • 2.1 – The equations for uniformly accelerated motion
  • 2.2 – Displacement-time, velocity-time and acceleration-time graphs
  • 2.3 – Scalars and vectors: resolving and finding resultants
  • 2.4 – Projectile motion
  • 2.5 – Free-body force diagrams
  • 2.6 – Newton's first and second laws of motion
  • 2.7 – Gravitational field strength and weight
  • Core practical 1: Determine the acceleration of a freely-falling object
  • 2.8 – Newton's third law of motion
  • 2.9 – Momentum and the principle of conservation of linear momentum
  • 2.10 – Moments, centre of gravity and the principle of moments
  • 2.11 – Work, including forces not along the line of motion
  • 2.12 – Kinetic energy and gravitational potential energy
  • 2.13 – The principle of conservation of energy
  • 2.14 – Power and efficiency

• Topic 3 — Electric Circuits

  • 3.1 – Current as the rate of flow of charge, and potential difference
  • 3.2 – Resistance and Ohm's law
  • 3.3 – Conservation of charge and energy in circuits
  • 3.4 – Resistances in series and parallel
  • 3.5 – Electrical power and energy
  • 3.6 – Current-potential difference graphs for components
  • 3.7 – Resistivity
  • Core practical 2: Determine the electrical resistivity of a material
  • 3.8 – I = nqvA and the range of resistivities
  • 3.9 – Potential along a uniform wire, and the potential divider
  • 3.10 – Potential divider circuits with thermistors and LDRs
  • 3.11 – Electromotive force, internal resistance and terminal potential difference
  • Core practical 3: Determine the e.m.f. and internal resistance of an electrical cell
  • 3.12 – Resistance and temperature, and resistance and illumination

• Topic 4 — Materials

  • 4.1 – Density and upthrust
  • 4.2 – Viscous drag and Stokes' Law
  • Core practical 4: Use a falling-ball method to determine the viscosity of a liquid
  • 4.3 – Hooke's law and stiffness
  • 4.4 – Stress, strain and the Young modulus
  • 4.5 – Force-extension graphs: limit of proportionality, elastic limit and yield point
  • 4.6 – Stress-strain graphs and breaking stress
  • Core practical 5: Determine the Young modulus of a material
  • 4.7 – Elastic strain energy

• Topic 5 — Waves and Particle Nature of Light

  • 5.1 – Amplitude, frequency, period, speed and wavelength, and the wave equation
  • 5.2 – Longitudinal and transverse waves and their graphs
  • Core practical 6: The speed of sound in air using an oscilloscope, signal generator, speaker and microphone
  • 5.3 – Wavefronts, coherence, path difference, superposition, interference and phase
  • 5.4 – Standing waves, nodes and antinodes, and the speed of a wave on a string
  • Core practical 7: Length, tension and mass per unit length and the frequency of a vibrating string or wire
  • 5.5 – Intensity of radiation
  • 5.6 – Refraction and refractive index
  • 5.7 – Critical angle and total internal reflection, and measuring the refractive index of a solid
  • 5.8 – Converging and diverging lenses: focal length and ray diagrams
  • 5.9 – Lens power, and thin lenses in combination
  • 5.10 – Real and virtual images, the thin lens equation and magnification
  • 5.11 – Plane polarisation
  • 5.12 – Diffraction and Huygens' construction
  • 5.13 – The diffraction grating
  • Core practical 8: The wavelength of light from a laser or other light source using a diffraction grating
  • 5.14 – Electron diffraction and the de Broglie equation
  • 5.15 – Waves transmitted and reflected at an interface, and pulse-echo techniques
  • 5.16 – The wave and photon models of electromagnetic radiation, and E = hf
  • 5.17 – Photoelectrons, threshold frequency and work function
  • 5.18 – The electronvolt, and the photoelectric effect as evidence for the particle nature of radiation
  • 5.19 – Atomic line spectra and energy levels

• Topic 6 — Further Mechanics

  • 6.1 – Impulse and Newton's second law of motion
  • Core practical 9: The force exerted on an object and its change of momentum
  • 6.2 – Conservation of linear momentum in two dimensions
  • Core practical 10: Use ICT to analyse collisions between small spheres, e.g. ball bearings on a table top
  • 6.3 – Elastic and inelastic collisions, and the kinetic energy of a particle
  • 6.4 – Angular displacement and angular velocity
  • 6.5 – Deriving centripetal acceleration from vector diagrams
  • 6.6 – Centripetal force

• Topic 7 — Electric and Magnetic Fields

  • 7.1 – Electric fields and electric field strength
  • 7.2 – The force between two charges
  • 7.3 – The electric field due to a point charge
  • 7.4 – Electric field and electric potential, and the field between parallel plates
  • 7.5 – Electric potential in a radial field
  • 7.6 – Field lines and equipotentials for radial and uniform electric fields
  • 7.7 – Capacitance
  • 7.8 – The energy stored by a capacitor
  • 7.9 – Charge and discharge curves and the time constant
  • Core practical 11: The p.d. across a capacitor as it charges and discharges through a resistor
  • 7.10 – Exponential discharge in a resistor-capacitor circuit and the log equations
  • 7.11 – Magnetic flux density, flux and flux linkage
  • 7.12 – Charged particles moving in a magnetic field: F = Bqv sin θ and Fleming's left-hand rule
  • 7.13 – Current-carrying conductors in a magnetic field: F = BIl sin θ
  • 7.14 – The factors affecting the e.m.f. induced in a coil
  • 7.15 – Lenz's law and Faraday's law
  • 7.16 – Alternating currents: frequency, period, peak and root-mean-square values

• Topic 8 — Nuclear and Particle Physics

  • 8.1 – Nucleon number, proton number and alpha particle scattering
  • 8.2 – Thermionic emission, and particle accelerators and detectors: the linac and the cyclotron
  • 8.3 – A charged particle in a magnetic field
  • 8.4 – Conservation of charge, energy and momentum, and particle tracks
  • 8.5 – High energies, and the creation and annihilation of matter and antimatter
  • 8.6 – MeV and GeV, their mass units, and relativistic particle lifetimes
  • 8.7 – The standard quark-lepton model and antiparticles
  • 8.8 – Conservation of charge, baryon number and lepton number, and particle equations

• Topic 9 — Thermodynamics

  • 9.1 – Specific heat capacity and specific latent heat
  • Core practical 12: Calibrate a thermistor in a potential divider circuit as a thermostat
  • Core practical 13: Determine the specific latent heat of a phase change
  • 9.2 – Internal energy, absolute zero and temperature
  • 9.3 – Deriving the kinetic theory equation for pV
  • 9.4 – The ideal gas equation pV = NkT
  • Core practical 14: Investigate the relationship between pressure and volume of a gas at fixed temperature
  • 9.5 – The mean kinetic energy of molecules and absolute temperature
  • 9.6 – Black body radiators and their radiation curves
  • 9.7 – The Stefan-Boltzmann law and Wien's law

• Topic 10 — Space

  • 10.1 – Intensity and luminosity
  • 10.2 – Astronomical distances by trigonometric parallax
  • 10.3 – Astronomical distances by standard candles
  • 10.4 – The Hertzsprung-Russell diagram
  • 10.5 – The Hertzsprung-Russell diagram and the life cycle of stars
  • 10.6 – The Doppler effect
  • 10.7 – Hubble's law
  • 10.8 – The age and ultimate fate of the universe

• Topic 11 — Nuclear Radiation

  • 11.1 – Nuclear binding energy, mass deficit and the atomic mass unit
  • 11.2 – Nuclear fusion and fission, and the binding energy per nucleon curve
  • 11.3 – Background radiation, and the nature and penetration of alpha, beta and gamma radiation
  • 11.4 – Nuclear equations
  • Core practical 15: Investigate the absorption of gamma radiation by lead
  • 11.5 – Radioactive decay: half-lives, activity and the decay equations

• Topic 12 — Gravitational Fields

  • 12.1 – Gravitational fields and gravitational field strength
  • 12.2 – Newton's law of universal gravitation
  • 12.3 – The gravitational field due to a point mass
  • 12.4 – Gravitational potential in a radial field
  • 12.5 – Comparing electric fields with gravitational fields
  • 12.6 – Orbital motion: applying Newton's laws of motion and universal gravitation

• Topic 13 — Oscillations

  • 13.1 – The condition for simple harmonic motion: F = −kx
  • 13.2 – The equations of a simple harmonic oscillator
  • 13.3 – The simple harmonic oscillator and the simple pendulum
  • 13.4 – Displacement-time and velocity-time graphs for an oscillating object
  • 13.5 – Resonance
  • Core practical 16: An unknown mass from the resonant frequencies of the oscillation of known masses
  • 13.6 – Energy in damped and undamped oscillating systems
  • 13.7 – Free and forced oscillations
  • 13.8 – Damping, resonance and the reduction of oscillation amplitude

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