Microsoft Excel Software Usage for Teaching Science and Engineering Curriculum

Abstract

In this article, our main objective is to present the use of Microsoft Software Excel 2007/2003 for teaching college and university level curriculum in science and engineering. In particular, we discuss two interesting and fascinating examples of interactive applications of Microsoft Excel targeted for undergraduate students in: 1) computational physics and physics education; and 2) computer and medical sciences. We demonstrate the tremendous amount of computational power of the most recent Microsoft Excel 2007 Software, which is employed here to perform simulations of a projectile (may be a missile) launched from an airplane so as to hit a target on the ground using the simplest assumption of no air resistance during the projectile motion in air and that of rolling of nine dice with six surfaces. For projectile motion, kinematic equations based on Newton's laws of uniform motion have been employed to simulate projectile trajectory. We are going to prove through a plot of vertical distance as a function time that the projectile motion undergoes a parabolic path. However, modification in the simulation equations of the projectile motion, which includes the effect of air resistance, change in gravitational force with altitude, curvature in the surface of Earth, Coriolis force due to Earth's spin motion about its axis of rotation, and wind speed, will be discussed in very near future. We will also plot a graph of normalized total score versus the maximum score for rolling of nine dice like in casino games.