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Coin Toss Modeling

Popular Physics 2022-08-16 v4

Abstract

The torque-free motion of rigid body in gravitational field is analyzed. The coin lands on a soft surface (such as the palm of the hand) that allows no bouncing. The model assumes the coin as a rigid body with constant angular momentum vector in the body frame, and no air resistance. Unbiased probabilities of heads and tails are obtained for various initial conditions accessible to a usual person.

Cite

@article{arxiv.1612.06705,
  title  = {Coin Toss Modeling},
  author = {Razvan C. Stefan and Tiberius O. Cheche},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1612.06705},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

11 pages, 11 figures

R2 v1 2026-06-22T17:29:37.633Z