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In Newtonian mechanics, gravity provides the centripetal force causing astronomical orbits. One common example involving centripetal force is the case in which a body moves with uniform speed along a circular path. The centripetal force is directed at right angles to the motion and also along the radius towards the centre of the circular path.
The normal force is actually the sum of the radial and tangential forces. The component of weight force is responsible for the tangential force (when we neglect friction). The centripetal force is due to the change in the direction of velocity. The normal force and weight may also point in the same direction.
The speed (or the magnitude of velocity) relative to the centre of mass is constant: [1]: 30 = = where: , is the gravitational constant, is the mass of both orbiting bodies (+), although in common practice, if the greater mass is significantly larger, the lesser mass is often neglected, with minimal change in the result.
Note: This page uses common physics notation for spherical coordinates, in which is the angle between the z axis and the radius vector connecting the origin to the point in question, while is the angle between the projection of the radius vector onto the x-y plane and the x axis. Several other definitions are in use, and so care must be taken ...
In particular, = for perfectly circular orbits (the central force exactly equals the centripetal force requirement, which determines the required angular velocity for a given circular radius). For a repulsive force (k > 0) only e > 1 applies.
The resultant force provides required centripetal force. Without this centripetal force frictionless objects would slide towards the equator. In calculations, when a coordinate system is used that is co-rotating with the Earth, the vector of the notional centrifugal force points outward, and is just as large as the vector representing the ...
There are many useful features of the effective potential, such as . To find the radius of a circular orbit, simply minimize the effective potential with respect to , or equivalently set the net force to zero and then solve for : = After solving for , plug this back into to find the maximum value of the effective potential .
Newton's law of gravitation resembles Coulomb's law of electrical forces, which is used to calculate the magnitude of the electrical force arising between two charged bodies. Both are inverse-square laws, where force is inversely proportional to the square of the distance between the bodies. Coulomb's law has charge in place of mass and a ...