MCAT Mnemonics: Standing Waves

Ken Tao is the MedSchoolCoach expert on MCAT, and helps you to remember the frequency of standing waves in pipes that are open/closed at both ends with the phrase: “I envy your tool.”

Full Transcription

Hey everyone. Welcome back to another MCAT Mnemonic Monday. My name is Ken and I’m an MCAT expert with MedSchoolCoach. Today, we have an MCAT physics mnemonic for you and it’s for memorizing a physics equation, and that equation is for calculating the frequency of standing waves in a pipe that is either open or closed at both ends.

So usually when you think about standing waves and pipes, you’re thinking about musical instruments. So you can consider, for example, a musician who is playing a flute. A flute is a pipe that is open at both ends and the musician is generating standing waves within the flute.

So since it’s a musician playing this instrument to make beautiful sounds you can say: I Envy Your Tool.

And that’s great, because the equation for calculating the frequency of the nth harmonic in a pipe, open or closed at both ends, and is fn is equal to NV over 2L. So you can say: I envy your tool.

So hopefully that helps you memorize this equation.