Physics Reference Guide

Laws, Theorems, Principles & Hypotheses (Class 11 & 12)

Class 11 Physics

Laws

• Newton's First Law of Motion: An object remains at rest or in uniform motion unless acted
upon by an external force.

• Newton's Second Law of Motion: The rate of change of momentum of a body is directly
proportional to the applied force.

• Newton's Third Law of Motion: For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

• Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation: Every particle attracts every other particle with a
force directly proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the
square of the distance between them.

• Law of Conservation of Linear Momentum: In the absence of an external force, the total
momentum of a system remains constant.

• Hooke's Law: Within the elastic limit, stress is directly proportional to strain.

• Pascal's Law: Pressure applied to an enclosed fluid is transmitted undiminished to every point
of the fluid.

• Stokes' Law: Describes the viscous drag force on a spherical body falling through a fluid.

• Newton's Law of Cooling: The rate of heat loss of a body is proportional to the temperature
difference between the body and its surroundings.

• Boyle's Law: At constant temperature, the volume of a fixed mass of gas is inversely
proportional to its pressure.

• Charles's Law: At constant pressure, the volume of a fixed mass of gas is directly proportional
to its absolute temperature.

• Gay-Lussac's Law: At constant volume, the pressure of a fixed mass of gas is directly
proportional to its absolute temperature.

• Avogadro's Law: Equal volumes of all gases under the same conditions of temperature and
pressure contain the same number of molecules.

• Dalton's Law of Partial Pressures: The total pressure exerted by a mixture of non-reacting
gases is equal to the sum of the partial pressures of individual gases.
 • Zeroth Law of Thermodynamics: If two systems are each in thermal equilibrium with a third,
they are in thermal equilibrium with each other.

• First Law of Thermodynamics: Energy supplied to a system is equal to the sum of the
increase in internal energy and the work done by the system.

• Second Law of Thermodynamics: Heat cannot spontaneously flow from a colder body to a
hotter body.

• Stefan-Boltzmann Law: The radiant energy emitted by a black body per unit area per unit time
is proportional to the fourth power of its absolute temperature.

• Wien's Displacement Law: The wavelength corresponding to maximum spectral emissive

power of a black body is inversely proportional to its absolute temperature.

• Law of Equipartition of Energy: The total energy of a dynamical system in thermal

equilibrium is shared equally among all its active degrees of freedom.

Theorems

• Work-Energy Theorem: The net work done on an object equals the change in its kinetic
energy.

• Theorem of Parallel Axes: The moment of inertia of a body about any axis is equal to its
moment of inertia about a parallel axis through its center of mass plus the product of its mass
and the square of the distance between the axes.

• Theorem of Perpendicular Axes: The moment of inertia of a planar lamina about an axis
perpendicular to its plane is equal to the sum of its moments of inertia about two perpendicular
axes concurrent with perpendicular axis and lying in the plane of the lamina.

• Bernoulli's Theorem: For an incompressible, non-viscous fluid in steady flow, the sum of
pressure energy, kinetic energy, and potential energy per unit mass is constant.

• Torricelli's Theorem: The velocity of efflux of a fluid through an orifice is equal to the velocity it
would acquire in falling freely from the free surface of the fluid to the orifice.

Principles

• Principle of Conservation of Energy: Energy can neither be created nor destroyed; it can
only be transformed from one form to another.

• Principle of Homogeneity of Dimensions: The dimensions of all the terms in a physical

equation must be the same.

• Principle of Moments: In equilibrium, the sum of clockwise moments about a point equals the
sum of anticlockwise moments.

• Archimedes' Principle: When a body is partially or fully immersed in a fluid, it experiences an

upward thrust equal to the weight of the fluid displaced by it.
 • Equation of Continuity: For the steady flow of an incompressible fluid, the product of the
cross-sectional area and fluid velocity remains constant.

• Principle of Calorimetry: In an insulated system, heat lost by a hot body is equal to heat
gained by a cold body.

Hypotheses

• Avogadro's Hypothesis: The initial formulation proposing that equal volumes of gases have
equal numbers of molecules, which later became accepted as a law.

Class 12 Physics

Laws

• Coulomb's Law: The electrostatic force between two point charges is directly proportional to
the product of their magnitudes and inversely proportional to the square of the distance
between them.

• Gauss's Law in Electrostatics: The total electric flux through a closed surface is equal to the
net charge enclosed divided by the permittivity of free space.

• Ohm's Law: The current flowing through a conductor is directly proportional to the potential
difference applied across its ends, provided physical conditions remain constant.

• Kirchhoff's Current Law: The algebraic sum of currents meeting at a junction in an electrical
circuit is zero.

• Kirchhoff's Voltage Law: The algebraic sum of changes in potential around any closed loop
within an electrical circuit is zero.

• Joule's Law of Heating: The heat produced in a resistor is directly proportional to the square
of the current, the resistance, and the time.

• Biot-Savart Law: The magnetic field due to a current element is directly proportional to the
current, length, and sine of the angle, and inversely proportional to the square of the distance.

• Ampere's Circuital Law: The line integral of the magnetic field around any closed path in free
space is equal to the absolute permeability times the net steady current enclosed.

• Faraday's Laws of Electromagnetic Induction: The induced electromotive force in a closed

circuit is equal to the negative rate of change of magnetic flux linked with the circuit.

• Lenz's Law: The direction of the induced current is such that it opposes the change in
magnetic flux that produced it.
 • Law of Reflection: The angle of incidence is equal to the angle of reflection, and the incident
ray, reflected ray, and normal all lie in the same plane.

• Snell's Law of Refraction: The ratio of the sine of the angle of incidence to the sine of the
angle of refraction is a constant for a given pair of media.

• Brewster's Law: When unpolarized light is incident on a transparent medium at the polarizing
angle, the reflected and refracted rays are perpendicular to each other.

• Malus's Law: The intensity of plane-polarized light transmitted through an analyzer varies as
the square of the cosine of the angle between the plane of transmission of the analyzer and the
polarizer.

• Radioactive Decay Law: The number of nuclei undergoing decay per unit time is proportional
to the total number of nuclei in the sample.

• Curie's Law: The magnetization of a paramagnetic material is directly proportional to the

applied magnetic field and inversely proportional to the absolute temperature.

Theorems

• Gauss's Theorem: The mathematical formulation of Gauss's Law relating flux to enclosed
charge.

Principles

• Principle of Superposition: The total force or field on a given charge is the vector sum of the
individual forces or fields exerted by other charges.

• Wheatstone Bridge Principle: In a balanced bridge network of four resistors, the ratio of
resistances in adjacent arms is equal.

• Potentiometer Principle: The potential difference across any portion of a wire of uniform
cross-section carrying a constant current is directly proportional to the length of that portion.

• Moving Coil Galvanometer Principle: A current-carrying coil placed in a magnetic field

experiences a torque.

• Huygens' Principle: Every point on a given wavefront acts as a fresh source of secondary
wavelets that travel in all directions with the speed of light.

• Principle of Reversibility of Light: If the path of a ray of light is reversed, it exactly retraces its
original path.

Hypotheses & Postulates

• Ampere's Hypothesis: All magnetic properties of matter are due to circulating atomic currents.
• Maxwell's Displacement Current Hypothesis: A time-varying electric field produces a
magnetic field in empty space.

• Planck's Quantum Hypothesis: Emission and absorption of radiation occur in discrete energy
quanta.

• Einstein's Photoelectric Hypothesis: Light consists of individual photons, each carrying a

discrete amount of energy.

• de Broglie Hypothesis: Material particles in motion possess a wave nature.

• Rutherford's Planetary Model Hypothesis: The atom consists of a tiny, dense, positively
charged core called a nucleus, around which electrons orbit.

• Bohr's Postulates of Hydrogen Atom: Electrons move in specific circular orbits without
radiating energy, and angular momentum is quantized.