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    JEE Main 2026 Physics High Weightage Chapters and Topics

    Variation Of Pressure - Practice Questions & MCQ

    Edited By admin | Updated on Sep 18, 2023 18:34 AM | #JEE Main

    Quick Facts

    • Variation of pressure is considered one of the most asked concept.

    • 50 Questions around this concept.

    Solve by difficulty

    Pressure is uniform on a horizontal line 

    A ball is made of a material of density $\rho$ where $ \rho_{\text {oil }}<\rho<\rho_{\text {water }}$ with $\rho_{\text {oil }}$ and $\rho_{\text {water }}$ representing the densities of oil and water, respectively. The oil and water are immiscible. If the above ball is in equilibrium in a mixture of this oil and water, which of the following pictures represents its equilibrium position?

    The maximum pressure is at the points

    The pressure on a swimmer 20 m below the surface of water at sea level is -

    The gauge pressure at the bottom of a tank containing a liquid does not depend on:

    A cylindrical vessel of base radius R and height H has a narrow neck of height $h$ and radius $r$ at one end. The vessel is filled with water (density $\rho_w$ ) and its neck is filled with immiscible oil (density $\rho_{o)}$. Then the pressure at

    Concepts Covered - 1

    Variation of pressure

     

    1. Variation of pressure with depth

    • Pressure varies with height/depth

           Have a look at the below figure

    Here P0= Atmospheric pressure at the upper surface

    And   h= depth below the  upper surface 

    $\rho=$ density of liquid
    $\mathrm{P}=$ Hydrostatic pressure for a point at depth h below the upper surface
    Then P is given by $P=P_0+\rho g h$
    Means Pressure increases with depth linearly.
    - $\quad$ Hydrostatic pressure $=$ Absolute $\operatorname{Pressure}=P=P_0+\rho g h$

    Absolute Pressure is always positive, It can never be zero.
    From equation $P=P_0+\rho g h$

    We can say that 

    1. Hydrostatic pressure depends on 

     

    • h=depth of the point below the surface

    • $\rho$=nature of liquid

    • g=acceleration due to gravity

    1. Hydrostatic pressure does not  depend on 

    • amount of liquid 

    • the shape of the container

          From this, we can say that for the below figure where the liquid is filled in vessels of different shapes to the same height,


     

                 

    the pressure at the base in each vessel will be the same, though

    the volume or weight of the liquid in different vessels will be different.

    I.e In the above figure $P_A=P_B=P_C$
    - Gauge Pressure- Gauge Pressure is known as the pressure difference between hydrostatic and atmospheric pressure.

    So Gauge Pressure is given as $P-P_0=$ gauge pressure

    In the equation

    $$
    P=P_0+\rho g h
    $$


    The term $\rho g h$ is known as pressure due to liquid column of height $h$
    We can rewrite the above equation as $\rho g h=P-P_0$
    Or we can say that Gauge Pressure $=\rho g h=P-P_0$
    It may be positive or negative or zero

    1. Variation of pressure along Horizontally

    The pressure is uniform on a horizontal line.

    For the below figure

        

            In horizontal line or in horizontal plane in stationary liquid

            $P_A=P_B=P_C$

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    Variation of pressure

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