Keskmass

Keskmass is a term used in scientific and engineering contexts to refer to the average or mean mass of a collection of objects or of a mass distribution. It captures the central tendency of mass values and, when masses are treated as random variables, corresponds to the expected value of the mass.

In a discrete dataset of masses, keskmass is the arithmetic mean m̄ = (1/N) ∑ m_i. If the masses carry weights w_i (such as probabilities or sampling weights), then m̄ = ∑ w_i m_i with ∑ w_i = 1. For continuous distributions with density f(m), the keskmass is m̄ = ∫ m f(m) dm, provided the integral exists. In probabilistic terms, m̄ is the first moment of the mass distribution.

Keskmass should not be confused with the center of mass. The center of mass is a spatial point determined by the positions and masses of all components; keskmass is a scalar quantity describing mass magnitude, not location. In systems with spatially varying density, both concepts relate, but they answer different questions.

Applications include material identification through mass measurements, quality control, statistical analysis of biological or industrial samples, and modeling of mass distributions in physics experiments. It provides a summary statistic that informs further analysis, comparisons, or design decisions.

Related concepts include mean, expected value, and center of mass.