Final answer:
To find the change in the cheetah's speed, the cheetah's acceleration is calculated using Newton's second law (a = F/m), resulting in an acceleration of 20 m/s². With this acceleration over 0.5 seconds, the cheetah experiences a change in speed of v = at, which equals 10 m/s.
Step-by-step explanation:
The question is asking to calculate the change in speed of a cheetah after it applies a force to accelerate while chasing its prey. To find this, we need to use the formula derived from Newton's second law of motion, F = ma, where F is force, m is mass, and a is acceleration. Since the problem provides the force and the mass of the cheetah, we can rearrange the formula to solve for acceleration, a = F/m. Plugging in the values, we get a = 600 N / 30 kg, which simplifies to a = 20 m/s². This is the acceleration of the cheetah during the 0.5 seconds of applying the force. Now that we have the acceleration, we can find the total change in the cheetah's speed using the formula v = at, where v is the final speed and t is the time. The change in the cheetah's speed is, therefore, v = 20 m/s² · 0.5 s, yielding a speed change of 10 m/s, which is not one of the answer choices provided in the question, indicating there may have been an error in the question's answer choices.