Does the unit of a quantity change if you take square root of it?

As the other answers (and dmckee's comments) note, yes, if you take the square root of a dimensional quantity then you need to take the square root of the units too:

$$ \sqrt{4\;{\rm kg}} = 2\;{\rm kg}^{\frac12} $$

And no, I can't think of any meaningful physical interpretation for the unit ${\rm kg}^{\frac12}$ either.

However, in the comments you say that you were "told to plot a graph of distance against square root of mass." What that means is simply that you should scale the mass axis non-linearly, presumably in order to more clearly show the relationship between the two quantities. For labeling the mass axis, you basically have two choices:

  • label the axis $\sqrt m$, with equally spaced ticks at, say, $1\;{\rm kg}^{\frac12}, 2\;{\rm kg}^{\frac12}, 3\;{\rm kg}^{\frac12}, 4\;{\rm kg}^{\frac12}, \dotsc$, or

  • label the axis $m$, with equally spaced ticks at $1\;{\rm kg}, 4\;{\rm kg}, 9\;{\rm kg}, 16\;{\rm kg}, \dotsc$.

While, technically, both of these are valid, I would strongly recommend the latter option. Just compare these two plots and see which one you find easier to read:

Plot with units of kg^(1/2), linear axis scaling $\hspace{60px}$ Plot with units of kg, quadratic axis scaling

Alas, not all plotting software necessarily supports such axis labeling, or at least doesn't make it easy, which is why you sometimes see plots with funny units like ${\rm kg}^{\frac12}$.


Yes, the dimension of a quantity changes if it is square-rooted. If $m$ is a mass with dimension $[m]=\textrm{kg}$, $\sqrt{m}$ is not a mass, but another quantity with dimension $[\sqrt{m}] = \textrm{kg}^{1/2}$.

More generally, if $[a] = A$ and if $[b]=B$, then $[a^n b^m] = A^nB^m$ etc.


It becomes the square root of the unit. Think of energy:

$$E = \frac{1}{2}mv^{2}$$

If I solve for $v$, I have $v = \sqrt{\frac{2E}{m}}$. Since $\rm 1 J = 1 kg \cdot m^{2}/s^{2}$, we see that the units have to obey the square root, or we will end up with our velocity equalling something other than m/s.