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On the Advance of the Perihelion According to Special Relativity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 November 2016

L. Karlov*
Affiliation:
The University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia

Extract

Undergraduate classes of physics and applied mathematics, in their studies of introductory relativity theory, are often presented with a special-relativistic calculation of the perihelion advance of planetary orbits. The result comes to be one-sixth of the gen-eral-relativistic value and serves as a demonstration of the inability of special relativity to account for the residual effect observed in the case of Mercury. As well, the calculation provides a rather pleasant example (perhaps more from the teacher’s viewpoint than the student’s) of two-dimensional relativistic particle dynamics.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Mathematical Association 1971

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References

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