Gases can exoerience the force of compression forces but is it possible for gases to experience the force of tension?
@shortstories I think only if you consider if as an effect from compression, then yes, in most normal conditions. Is there an official answer? Very interesting question I'd never considered.
I am thinking because gases always expand to fit the container they can not be pulled or stretched by a force because gases always become as big as possible on their own so there is no where to sttectch them towards with a force that they have not already occupied
Maybe if a electromagnetic force or graviational force outside the container pulls on part of the gas inside the container causing it to expand and change the shape and size of the container then that might be tension?
When force is used to make a spring shorter that force is called positive compression or negative tension
When the shortened spring returns to it's original size that is because compression is reduced to zero but no positive tension occured
When force is used to make a spring longer that force is called positive tension or negative compression
When the lengthened spring returns to it's original size that is because tension is reduced to zero but no positive compression occured
What I said is a over simplification because it ignores the effects of the temperature of the spring and the pressure of the medium the spring is in
When we think of a spring having zero compression that is technically not true because of air pressure if it is for examp!e lying on a table in the air and no perfect vacuum exists
Also I am only thinking of forces in one direction and ignoring gravity
The potential energy of the spring is the integral of the tension or compression with respect to the change in distance ( called displacement )
If the force equals the displacement times a constant
Then the integral results in
0.5*constant*displacement*displacement
0.5kx^2 = Potential energy
where kx = tension or compression
x = displacement
k = constant
tension is force
tension is not length nor displacement nor distance nor stretch(ing)
tension is not potential energy
@shortstories That's why I was thinking if you consider the compression of the air to be "tension," like a spring, where once released, it would expand to the size it wants to be.
I don't remember if there is another word for that potential energy in a spring if it isn't tension. If there is I'm sure I've heard it but can't get my brain on that path to remember it at the moment.