MCAT Flashcards: Conduction

What is conduction? Ken Tao is an MCAT expert and explains that conduction is heat transfer by direct contact from an object of higher temperature to an object of lower temperature. Faster moving molecules transfer energy to slower moving molecules when they collide. This can occur with solids, liquids, or gases.

Full Transcription

In this flash card video, we’re going to discuss “What is conduction?”

Conduction is heat transfer by direct contact from an object of higher temperature to an object of lower temperature. So essentially, if you have an object at high temperature and an object at a low temperature, if you bring these two objects in contact heat is going to flow from the object of higher temperature to the object of lower temperature.

Examples include if you take your hand and you touch a hot metal pan then heat is going to be transferred from the hot metal pan to your hands by conduction.

Similarly, if you wash your hands in hot water, heat is being transferred from the hot water to your hands by conduction. The key thing here is that conduction requires direct contact.