High School

Heat is measured in:

A. g/cm\(^3\)

B. degrees Celsius

C. degrees Celsius and degrees Fahrenheit

D. degrees Fahrenheit

E. calories

Answer :

Heat is measured in calories, where one calorie is the amount of energy needed to raise the temperature of 1 gram of water by 1 degree Celsius. The joule is another unit for energy that can be used to express heat. The specific heat of a substance indicates how much energy is required to change its temperature, and for water, this is 1 calorie/gram °C. So the correct option is E.

Heat is measured in a unit called a calorie, defined as the amount of heat necessary to raise the temperature of 1 gram of water by 1 degree Celsius. The calorie is an important unit of measurement in thermodynamics and plays a crucial role in understanding energy changes within physical and chemical processes. The calorie can also be related to the joule, the SI unit of energy, where 1 calorie equals approximately 4.184 joules.

In dietary terms, what is often referred to as a calorie is actually a kilocalorie (kcal), which means that when food packaging indicates 85 Calories, it contains 85,000 calories or 85 kcal. Temperature, on the other hand, is measured in degrees Celsius (°C) or degrees Fahrenheit (°F) but is not the correct unit for measuring heat.

It is essential to differentiate between the concepts of temperature and heat. While temperature is a measure of the thermal energy within a substance or object, heat refers to the transfer of thermal energy between systems and is always measured in terms of energy units like calories or joules.

The specific heat is another related concept, defined as the amount of energy needed to raise the temperature of a specified amount (usually 1 gram) of a substance by 1°C. For water, the specific heat is typically 1 calorie/gram °C, which is a characteristic that plays an integral role in Earth's heat budget due to water's ability to absorb and store heat effectively. So the correct option is E.