Space Science with Python #7: Gravitational Pull
The Solar System Barycenter (SSB) dances around … inside and outside the Sun. But who are the major drivers of the SSB’s movement?
Tutorial video #6 took a look at the so called Solar System Barycenter (SSB). Despite Kepler’s first law that all objects revolve around the Sun, each object has its own gravitational pull, contributing to a common barycenter.
This barycenter is the actual gravitational center of our Solar System. But are there any major drivers that affect the movement of the SSB? Indeed: The outer gas giants Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune influence this center severely. In this video #7 we will take a look at these influences and consider some geometry to determine the correlation of the SSB’s movement and alignment with the gas giants:
As always, the corresponding GitHub code can be found in the following sub-directory:
Furthermore an animation of the SSB’s movement has been done to visualize the effects of Jupiter and Saturn. Another video will follow on this topic, too:
Best,
Thomas
