Thursday 26 November 2015

newtonian mechanics - Why are orbits elliptical?



Almost all of the orbits of planets and other celestial bodies are elliptical, not circular.


Is this due to gravitational pull by other nearby massive bodies? If this was the case a two body system should always have a circular orbit.


Is that true?



Answer



No, any ellipse is a stable orbit, as shown by Johannes Kepler.


A circle happens to be one kind of ellipse, and it's not any more likely or preferable than any other ellipse. And since there are so many more non-circular ellipses (infinitely many), it's simply highly unlikely for two bodies to orbit each other in a perfect circle.



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