Roller Coasters by Dr. Matt Johnson, IHMC

February 22, 2025

The February topic was “Roller Coasters”, presented by Matt Johnson, Senior Research Scientist at IHMC. Students designed and constructed simple roller coasters using plastic tubing, in order to learn about and experiment with the physics concepts that apply to roller coasters. The focus was on kinetic energy, potential energy, and friction. Challenges included making the biggest hill, the biggest loop, and the most loops. Small ball bearings were used as the “cars” that went through each roller coaster.