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The Effect of Radiation Pressure on the Restricted Three-body Problem
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 August 2015
Abstract
The classical restricted three-body problem is generalized to include the force of radiation pressure and the Poynting-Robertson effect. The positions of the Lagrangian points L4 and L5 are found as functions of β, the ratio of radiational to gravitational forces. The Poynting-Robertson effect renders the L4 and L5 points unstable on a time scale (T) long compared to the period of rotation of the two massive bodies. For the solar system, T is given by T = [(1-β)2/3/β] 544 a2 yr where a is the separation between the Sun and the planet in AU. Implications for space colonization and a mechanism for producing asymmetries in the interplanetary dust complex are discussed; testing the latter may be possible from the Zodiacal Light/Background Starlight Experiment aboard the International Solar Polar Mission spacecraft to be launched in 1983.
- Type
- III: The Interplanetary Dust Complex 1. Sources, Evolution, and Dynamics
- Information
- Symposium - International Astronomical Union , Volume 90: Solid Particles in the Solar System , 1980 , pp. 285 - 288
- Copyright
- Copyright © Reidel 1980
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