What is the measure of the average speed of particles?

Answer 1

It is called the root mean square of the velocity.

Temperature is a measurement of the kinetic energy of a system. It is expressed as

E=1/2mv2

where
E=energy
m=mass of the particles
v= the velocity of the particles.

Now it is understood that there will be a wide variance in the speed of all particles in the system but as we get only one temperature reading - that reading suggest a particular speed. This is where the word 'mean' comes from.

solving for v then gives

v=SQRT(2E/m)

Wouldn't it be nice if Wikianswers gave us more mathematical symbols to work with?

Answer 2

The measure of the average speed of particles is calculated by finding the total distance traveled by all particles and dividing it by the total time elapsed. This average speed gives an indication of the overall speed at which the particles are moving within a system.