What happens to light energy when the light is absorbed?
(Its converted into heat, or sometimes chemical energy in a “photochemical reaction”). • What other transformations of energy are there? (When you run, you convert chemical energy – food sugars that is – into mechanical energy and heat. When you turn on a light, you convert electrical energy into light energy and heat. When you rub your fingers on the table, you convert mechanical energy into heat via friction. When you boil water, you first convert chemical or electrical energy into heat, and then some of the heat is converted into the kinetic mechanical energy of the boiling water. Nuclear reactions in the Sun and elsewhere can actually transform matter into energy and energy into matter). • How was energy and its properties discovered? (Mechanical energy and its properties where discovered several hundred years ago by scientists as soon as they started using mathematical equations to describe the way things move in the world. Without these equations, it would be hard to know or even
