[Physics] Inertia on relativistic mass when particle is near speed of light

inertiamassspecial-relativityspeed-of-light

Inertia is directly proportional to mass but what happens when something travel to speed near to light. Its relativistic mass tends to infinity but that is false mass so I want to know if inertia is applied to relativistic mass. Because if we infinite the mass then the inertia would also be infinite then it will never reach speed of light.

Best Answer

By inertia I assume you mean momentum. The momentum is related to the energy of the object by:

$$ E^2 = p^2c^2 + m^2c^4 $$

and to the velocity by:

$$ p = \frac{mv}{\sqrt{1 - \frac{v^2}{c^2}}} $$

The momentum does indeed tend to infinity as $v \rightarrow c$, but note that it will never reach an infinite value because no massive object can travel at the speed of light so $v$ never reaches $c$.

Related Question