An Introduction to Celestial Mechanics
A complete set of lecture notes for a graduate celestial mechanics course. The course concentrates on
those aspects of celestial mechanics that can be studied analytically. Topics covered include
gravitational potential theory, Keplerian orbit theory, the precession of planetary perihelia, the figure of the Earth,
tidal interactions between the Earth, Moon, and Sun, the free and forced precession and nutation of the Earth, the three-body problem, lunar motion, and
orbital perturbation theory.
The lecture notes are availible in various formats:
- [HTML]
- A fully hyperlinked HTML document.
- [BOOK]
- A hardback book based on the lecture notes and published by Cambridge University Press.
Celestial Mechanics Software
- Syzygy [GzippedTarArchive]
- A C program to calculate the equinoxes, solstices, new moons, and full moons in a given year.
The program employs the VSOP87 model of planetary motion, and the ELP2000-82B model of lunar motion.
- SunEclipse [GzippedTarArchive]
- A C program to calculate the details of the solar eclipses occuring in a given year.
A python script is supplied that allows the path of the eclipse to be mapped on the Earth's surface.
Click here to get list of other courses available on this site.
Richard Fitzpatrick
Last modified: Sat Apr 20 11:59:20 CDT 2013