Table of Contents

Vectors are essential to physics and engineering. Many fundamental physical quantities are vectors, including displacement, velocity, force, and electric and magnetic vector fields. Scalar products of vectors define other fundamental scalar physical quantities, such as energy. Vector products of vectors define still other fundamental vector physical quantities, such as torque and angular momentum.

One-dimensional kinematics describes motion along a straight line using functions such as velocity and acceleration. These functions calculate the object's rate of change in properties like time and position. Relationships between the functions are determined using derivatives and integral calculus. Vectors geometrically indicate the object's motion at any given instant with respect to a given function.