Question

For earth, Acceleration due to gravity

Prove that the weight of a body at the centre of the Earth is zero.

Derive the expression for the acceleration due to gravity at a depth 'd' from the surface of the earth.

Early in our lives, we become aware of the tendency of all material objects to be attracted to the earth. Anything thrown up falls down towards the earth, going uphill is lot more tiring than going downhill, raindrops from the clouds above fall towards the earth and there are many other such phenomena. Historically it was the Italian Physicist Galileo (1564-1642) who recognized the fact that all bodies, irrespective of their masses, are accelerated towards the earth with a constant acceleration. It is said that he made a public demonstration of this fact. To find the truth, he certainly did experiments with bodies rolling down inclined planes and arrived at a value of the acceleration due to gravity which is close to the more accurate value obtained later.