Question

The specific heat of gold is 0.031 calories/gram°C and the specific heat of silver is 0.057 calories/gram°C. If equal amounts of each metal are exposed to equal heating, which will heat up faster?

Answer 1

Answer : Gold will heat up faster.

Explanation : Given,

The Specific heat of Silver and gold are 0.057 & 0.0314 $calories/gram^{0}C$ respectively.

Specific heat is the amount of energy/heat required to raise the temperature of 1 Kg mass by 1 Kelvin.

The formula of Specific heat is,

$q=m\times c\times (T_{final}-T_{initial})$

Where,

c = Specific heat

q = Heat required

$T_{final}$ = final temperature

$T_{initial}$ = initial temperature

we are taking initial temperature as zero. According to the question, the mass and the heat are same.

Now put all the values in above formula, we get

For gold,

$q=m\times 0.031\times (T_{gold}-0)$        .........(1)

For silver,

$q=m\times 0.057\times (T_{silver}-0)$      ......... (2)

Now equating equation (1) and (2), we get

$T_{gold}=1.83\times T_{silver}$

From this, we conclude that the temperature of gold is 1.83 times higher than the temperature of silver.

Therefore, Gold will heat up faster.  

Answer 2

I think the substance that will heat up faster would be the silver metal since it has a higher heat capacity. Heat capacity is the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of the system into one degree. Heat capacity and heat energy is directly related so higher value of heat capacity would lead to higher heat energy.