Eugene Butikov 
Motions of Celestial Bodies 
Computer simulations

This book is written for a wide range of graduate and undergraduate students studying various courses in physics and astronomy. It is accompanied by the award-winning educational software package ‚Planets and Satellites‘ developed by the author. This text, together with the interactive software, is intended to help students learn and understand the fundamental concepts and the laws of physics as they apply to the fascinating world of the motions of natural and artificial celestial bodies. The primary aim of the book is the understanding of the foundations of classical and modern physics, while their application to celestial mechanics is used to illustrate these concepts. The simulation programs create vivid and lasting impressions of the investigated phenomena, and provide students and their instructors with a powerful tool that enables them to explore basic concepts that are difficult to study and teach in an abstract conventional manner. Students can work with the text and software at a pace that they can enjoy, varying parameters of the simulated systems. Each section of the textbook is supplied with questions, exercises, and problems. Using some of the suggested simulation programs, students have an opportunity to perform interesting mini-research projects in physics and astronomy.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Preface 1 Introduction: Getting Started I Review of the Simulations 2 Kepler’s Laws 3 Hodograph of the Velocity Vector 4 Satellites and Missiles 5 Active Maneuvers in Space Orbits 6 Precession of an Equatorial Orbit 7 Binary Star-the Two-Body Problem 8 Three-Body Systems 9 Many-Body Systems in Celestial Mechanics II The Simulated Phenomena 10 Phenomena and Concepts 11 Theoretical Background Glossary

Über den Autor

Eugene Butikov is a professor of physics at St Petersburg State University in Russia, where he teaches general physics, optics, quantum theory of solids and theory of oscillations. His research work is associated with solid-state physics (quantum theory of electronic paramagnetic resonance, theory of Josephson effects in weak superconductivity) and theory of nonlinear oscillations. He has written several textbooks and handbooks on physics that are widely used in Russia, and is a co-author of the Concise Handbook of Mathematics and Physics, CRC Press, 1997. He devotes a lot of time and effort to developing interactive educational software for university-level physics students to investigate mathematical models of physical systems.