Thursday, 16 May 2013

orbital elements - Name for 1-e and 1+e terms?

As the commenter states, e is indeed called the orbital eccentricity. If you add a radial scale length (e.g., semi-major axis) to both of those values the 1e describes the periapsis (closest approach of orbit) and the 1+e apoapsis (furthest) of an elliptical orbit. They don't have a specific special name, as they are dimensionless measures, but can be quite useful in determining the orbit of planets and other Keplerian systems.



Periapsis:
rp=a(1e)


Apoapsis:
ra=a(1+e)



Perhaps the could be named the maximum radial eccentricity and minimum radial eccentricity, if you needed to describe these parameters in a report or class homework etc.

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