All Questions
Tagged with newtonian-gravity celestial-mechanics
373
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Has our knowledge of astrophysics and gravity reached the point where we can accurately calculate Lagrange points?
is it possible for us today given the knowledge we possess of gravity and our success with inserting satellites in to steady/ geosynchronous orbit and any knowledge we have on the relative size (and ...
- 107
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Gravitational collapse - proof that energy dissipation is required?
As an undergraduate, I took a short course on astrophysics, where I encountered the Jeans mass. This is the critical mass for a spherical cloud of interstellar gas above which the cloud is predicted ...
- 317
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Restricted 3-body: one large mass and two smaller ones
A restricted 3-body problem is usually understood as two large bodies and one much smaller one that doesn't affect the motion of the other two.
I am curious about a 3-body problem with one large body, ...
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What changes the velocity perpendicular to radius in an elliptical orbit?
I'm working currently on a problem that asks to justify that angular momentum and kinetic energy conserves for a planet in an elliptical orbit. Although I've been taught that angular momentum should ...
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Find eccentricity of orbit given the velocity and the semi-major axis
Is it possible to calculate eccentricity of orbit knowing only the semi-major axis and the velocity of both celestial bodies? If not, what other additional information is required.
Does the fact that ...
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When are two object guaranteed to keep getting further and further away?
In a two-body problem, it is known (if I understand correctly) that if the specific orbital energy of the system is $\varepsilon \geq0$, then the objects must eventually escape each other. My question ...
- 125
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Speed of satellite in elliptical orbit [closed]
A satellite $S$ orbits a planet of mass $M$ in an elliptical orbit. At perihelion, $S$ has a tangential velocity of $v_1$ and is distance $r_1$ from the planet. At aphelion, $S$ has a velocity of $v_2$...
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Tidal forces in the early solar system
I'm reading a book called "Gravity from the ground up" by Bernard Schutz. I don't understand this section from Investigation 13.3 on page 159, which discusses the formation of the solar ...
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Average Speed in one half of an elliptical orbit
I was wondering whether the average speed along one half of an elliptical orbit (say in a star planet system) had a closed form exact solution using Kepler's laws.
My approach was using the ...
2
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2
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124
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Orbiting body around a star
Let us assume there's a body with mass $m$ and velocity $v$, at a distance $r$ from another body of mass $M$. The velocity vector is perpendicular to the radial vector. With these values, how do we ...
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Two bodies orbiting around barycenter
There are two bodies with masses $m_1$ and $m_2$ orbiting around barycenter. Distances to both bodies from barycenter are $r_1$ and $r_2$ . First body has known velocity $v_1$ as on the picture :
My ...
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How does moving the pericenter affect the apocenter?
A perfectly circular orbit of a constant height (distance from the center of mass of the orbited planet) around a perfectly spherical planet with smooth surface and no gravitational anomalies will ...
4
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730
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Do orbits with positive energy tend to infinity?
Consider any potential field $$V = V(x)$$ (not limited to gravitational potential field, but we only consider time-independent ones) in 3-d space that satisfies the following conditions:
The ...
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Different transfer trajectories between same planets
I was working on desmos drawing transfer trajectories between the earth and moon. I managed to draw both the trajectories but i noticed something rather odd. The transfer orbits were different ...
- 91
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Dynamics of Eliptical Orbit
For a circular orbit, we can resolve the forces acting on it along the radial and tangential axes. However, along which orthogonal axes should I resolve the forces acting on a body traveling in an ...
