There are a seemingly endless number of units in Physics
These can all be reduced to six base units from which every other unit can be derived
These seven units are referred to as the SIBaseUnits; this is the only system of measurement that is officially used in almost every country around the world
SI Base units:
A) Mass
B) Length
C) Time
D) Current
E) Temperature
F) substance
These base units are then used to derive other common units
These units have special names, for example:
Newtons, N [kg m / s2]
Joules, J [N m]
Pascals, Pa [kg / m s2]
Common units:
A) hertz
B) Force
C) joule
D) Power
E) pascal
F) Electrical charge
G) volt
H) resistance
I) tesla
Prefixes
Physical quantities can span a huge range of values
Powers of ten are numbers that can be achieved by multiplying 10 times itself
These come under two categories of units:
Multiples
Sub-multiples
Each power of ten is defined by a prefix, these are listed in the table below:
