* . *
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact
Tuesday, June 17, 2025
Earth-News
  • Home
  • Business
  • Entertainment
    Elisabeth Moss’ ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ Emmy chances, by the numbers – Yahoo

    Elisabeth Moss’ ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ Emmy chances, by the numbers – Yahoo

    ‘Gangs of London’ Producer Explains Season 3 Deaths, Hypes Season 4 – Citizen Tribune

    Gangs of London’ Producer Reveals Shocking Season 3 Deaths and Teases Exciting Season 4

    The Iconic Missouri Diner That Gives You A Taste Of Live Entertainment With Your Meal – Yahoo

    Savor Delicious Meals While Enjoying Live Entertainment at Missouri’s Iconic Diner

    Keke Palmer Revealed How She Came Up With Her Son Leodis’ Name – Yahoo

    Keke Palmer Shares the Heartwarming Story Behind Her Son Leodis’ Name

    The Media and Entertainment Deal Machine Is Revving Up – WSJ

    The Media and Entertainment Deal Machine Is Gearing Up for Action

    Op-Ed: Data Storage and Protection in Today’s Media & Entertainment Industry – Sports Video Group

    How Data Storage and Protection Are Transforming the Media & Entertainment Industry

  • General
  • Health
  • News

    Cracking the Code: Why China’s Economic Challenges Aren’t Shaking Markets, Unlike America’s” – Bloomberg

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Trending Tags

    • Trump Inauguration
    • United Stated
    • White House
    • Market Stories
    • Election Results
  • Science
  • Sports
  • Technology
    Further Upside For Aeries Technology, Inc (NASDAQ:AERT) Shares Could Introduce Price Risks After 27% Bounce – simplywall.st

    Further Upside For Aeries Technology, Inc (NASDAQ:AERT) Shares Could Introduce Price Risks After 27% Bounce – simplywall.st

    Editor’s Pick: 9 Books on Technology – The Gospel Coalition

    9 Must-Read Books That Will Completely Transform How You Understand Technology

    New Semiconductor Technology Could Supercharge 6G Delivery – SciTechDaily

    Revolutionary Semiconductor Technology Set to Turbocharge 6G Connectivity

    UTC To Host Quantum Technology Workshop June 23-25 – Chattanoogan.com: Breaking News

    Join the Quantum Technology Workshop This June 23-25!

    Rimac Technology Powers the Bugatti Tourbillon with Cutting-Edge Battery and Powertrain Tech – Rimac Newsroom

    Rimac Technology Drives the Bugatti Tourbillon with Revolutionary Battery and Powertrain Innovation

    “Co-creation” boosts commercial technology for dual-use defense applications – Breaking Defense

    “Co-creation” boosts commercial technology for dual-use defense applications – Breaking Defense

    Trending Tags

    • Nintendo Switch
    • CES 2017
    • Playstation 4 Pro
    • Mark Zuckerberg
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Business
  • Entertainment
    Elisabeth Moss’ ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ Emmy chances, by the numbers – Yahoo

    Elisabeth Moss’ ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ Emmy chances, by the numbers – Yahoo

    ‘Gangs of London’ Producer Explains Season 3 Deaths, Hypes Season 4 – Citizen Tribune

    Gangs of London’ Producer Reveals Shocking Season 3 Deaths and Teases Exciting Season 4

    The Iconic Missouri Diner That Gives You A Taste Of Live Entertainment With Your Meal – Yahoo

    Savor Delicious Meals While Enjoying Live Entertainment at Missouri’s Iconic Diner

    Keke Palmer Revealed How She Came Up With Her Son Leodis’ Name – Yahoo

    Keke Palmer Shares the Heartwarming Story Behind Her Son Leodis’ Name

    The Media and Entertainment Deal Machine Is Revving Up – WSJ

    The Media and Entertainment Deal Machine Is Gearing Up for Action

    Op-Ed: Data Storage and Protection in Today’s Media & Entertainment Industry – Sports Video Group

    How Data Storage and Protection Are Transforming the Media & Entertainment Industry

  • General
  • Health
  • News

    Cracking the Code: Why China’s Economic Challenges Aren’t Shaking Markets, Unlike America’s” – Bloomberg

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Trending Tags

    • Trump Inauguration
    • United Stated
    • White House
    • Market Stories
    • Election Results
  • Science
  • Sports
  • Technology
    Further Upside For Aeries Technology, Inc (NASDAQ:AERT) Shares Could Introduce Price Risks After 27% Bounce – simplywall.st

    Further Upside For Aeries Technology, Inc (NASDAQ:AERT) Shares Could Introduce Price Risks After 27% Bounce – simplywall.st

    Editor’s Pick: 9 Books on Technology – The Gospel Coalition

    9 Must-Read Books That Will Completely Transform How You Understand Technology

    New Semiconductor Technology Could Supercharge 6G Delivery – SciTechDaily

    Revolutionary Semiconductor Technology Set to Turbocharge 6G Connectivity

    UTC To Host Quantum Technology Workshop June 23-25 – Chattanoogan.com: Breaking News

    Join the Quantum Technology Workshop This June 23-25!

    Rimac Technology Powers the Bugatti Tourbillon with Cutting-Edge Battery and Powertrain Tech – Rimac Newsroom

    Rimac Technology Drives the Bugatti Tourbillon with Revolutionary Battery and Powertrain Innovation

    “Co-creation” boosts commercial technology for dual-use defense applications – Breaking Defense

    “Co-creation” boosts commercial technology for dual-use defense applications – Breaking Defense

    Trending Tags

    • Nintendo Switch
    • CES 2017
    • Playstation 4 Pro
    • Mark Zuckerberg
No Result
View All Result
Earth-News
No Result
View All Result
Home Science

What is the 3-body problem, and is it really unsolvable?

June 10, 2024
in Science
What is the 3-body problem, and is it really unsolvable?
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

A large star is in the background and a red orb is in front. There's an even smaller darker orb in front of that.

An artist’s rendering of Kepler 16-b and its two suns.
(Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

A rocket launch. Our nearest stellar neighbor. A Netflix show. All of these things have something in common: They must contend with the “three-body problem.” But exactly what is this thorny physics conundrum?

The three-body problem describes a system containing three bodies that exert gravitational forces on one another. While it may sound simple, it’s a notoriously tricky problem and “the first real worry of Newton,” Billy Quarles, a planetary dynamicist at Valdosta State University in Georgia, told LiveScience.

In a system of only two bodies, like a planet and a star, calculating how they’ll move around each other is fairly straightforward: Most of the time, those two objects will orbit roughly in a circle around their center of mass, and they’ll come back to where they started each time. But add a third body, like another star, and things get a lot more complicated. The third body attracts the two orbiting each other, pulling them out of their predictable paths.

The motion of the three bodies depends on their starting state — their positions, velocities and masses. If even one of those variables changes, the resulting motion could be completely different. 

“I think of it as if you’re walking on a mountain ridge,” Shane Ross, an applied mathematician at Virginia Tech, told Live Science. “With one small change, you could either fall to the right or you could fall to the left. Those are two very close initial positions, and they could lead to very different states.”  

There aren’t enough constraints on the motions of the bodies to solve the three-body problem with equations, Ross said. 

But some solutions to the three-body problem have been found. For example, if the starting conditions are just right, three bodies of equal mass could chase one another in a figure-eight pattern. Such tidy solutions are the exception, however, when it comes to real systems in space.

Sign up to our newsletter for the latest updates on rocket launches, skywatching events and more!

Certain conditions can make the three-body problem easier to parse. Consider Tatooine, Luke Skywalker’s fictional home world from “Star Wars” — a single planet orbiting two suns. Those two stars and the planet make up a three-body system. But if the planet is far enough away and orbiting both stars together, it’s possible to simplify the problem. 

Related: Mathematicians find 12,000 new solutions to ‘unsolvable’ 3-body problem

An artist's rendering of Kepler 16-b and its two suns

This artist image illustrates Kepler-16b, the first directly detected circumbinary planet, which is a planet that orbits two stars. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

“When it’s the Tatooine case, as long as you’re far enough away from the central binary, then you think of this object as just being a really fat star,” Quarles said. The planet doesn’t exert much force on the stars because it’s so much less massive, so the system becomes similar to the more easily solvable two-body problem. So far, scientists have found more than a dozen Tatooine-like exoplanets, Quarles told Live Science.

But often, the orbits of the three bodies never truly stabilize, and the three-body problem gets “solved” with a bang. The gravitational forces could cause two of the three bodies to collide, or they could fling one of the bodies out of the system forever — a possible source of “rogue planets” that don’t orbit any star, Quarles said. In fact, three-body chaos may be so common in space that scientists estimate there may be 20 times as many rogue planets as there are stars in our galaxy.

When all else fails, scientists can use computers to approximate the motions of bodies in an individual three-body system. That makes it possible to predict the motion of a rocket launched into orbit around Earth, or to predict the fate of a planet in a system with multiple stars.

With all this tumult, you might wonder if anything could survive on a planet like the one featured in Netflix’s “3 Body Problem,” which — spoiler alert — is trapped in a chaotic orbit around three stars in the Alpha Centauri system, our solar system’s nearest neighbor. 

“I don’t think in that type of situation, that’s a stable environment for life to evolve,” Ross said. That’s one aspect of the show that remains firmly in the realm of science fiction.

Join our Space Forums to keep talking space on the latest missions, night sky and more! And if you have a news tip, correction or comment, let us know at: [email protected].

Skyler Ware is a freelance science journalist covering chemistry, biology, paleontology and Earth science. She was a 2023 AAAS Mass Media Science & Engineering Fellow at Science News. Her work has also appeared in Science News Explores, ZME Science and Chembites, among others. Skyler has a Ph.D. in chemistry from Caltech.

>>> Read full article>>>
Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source : Space.com – https://www.space.com/3-body-problem-is-it-really-unsolvable

Tags: Body problemscience
Previous Post

Astronauts test SpaceX Starship hardware and spacesuits for Artemis 3 moon mission (photos)

Next Post

How to watch the Xbox Games Showcase and Call of Duty Direct

Safran and Bombardier announce defense technology innovation partnership – Safran

Safran and Bombardier Join Forces to Revolutionize Defense Technology

June 16, 2025
Bee-lieve the buzz: Honeybees help Delaware agriculture, ecology – Bay to Bay News

Bee-lieve the buzz: Honeybees help Delaware agriculture, ecology – Bay to Bay News

June 16, 2025
NCSE welcomes Britt Miller – National Center for Science Education

NCSE welcomes Britt Miller – National Center for Science Education

June 16, 2025
Science is on the federal chopping block and North Carolinians will suffer – NC Newsline

Federal Science Funding Slashed: How North Carolinians Will Be Impacted

June 16, 2025
Does yard work count as exercise? UI expert provides tips to maintain a healthy lifestyle during busy summer months – Iowa Now

Is Yard Work Really Exercise? Expert Tips for Staying Healthy During Busy Summer Months

June 16, 2025
Insurers must promote the blue economy – Eco-Business

Insurers must promote the blue economy – Eco-Business

June 16, 2025
Elisabeth Moss’ ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ Emmy chances, by the numbers – Yahoo

Elisabeth Moss’ ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ Emmy chances, by the numbers – Yahoo

June 16, 2025
Tariffs Are Driving 2026 Health Insurance Premiums Up – KFF

Tariffs Are Driving 2026 Health Insurance Premiums Up – KFF

June 16, 2025
Minnesota, Known for Bipartisan Civility, Reels After Attack on Lawmakers – The New York Times

Minnesota, Known for Bipartisan Civility, Reels After Attack on Lawmakers – The New York Times

June 16, 2025
FDA Grants Sarepta Therapeutics Platform Technology Designation to Expedite Gene Therapy Reviews – geneonline.com

FDA Accelerates Gene Therapy Reviews with Breakthrough Platform Technology for Sarepta Therapeutics

June 16, 2025

Categories

Archives

June 2025
MTWTFSS
 1
2345678
9101112131415
16171819202122
23242526272829
30 
« May    
Earth-News.info

The Earth News is an independent English-language daily published Website from all around the World News

Browse by Category

  • Business (20,132)
  • Ecology (689)
  • Economy (703)
  • Entertainment (21,606)
  • General (15,413)
  • Health (9,744)
  • Lifestyle (708)
  • News (22,149)
  • People (705)
  • Politics (710)
  • Science (15,921)
  • Sports (21,202)
  • Technology (15,689)
  • World (683)

Recent News

Safran and Bombardier announce defense technology innovation partnership – Safran

Safran and Bombardier Join Forces to Revolutionize Defense Technology

June 16, 2025
Bee-lieve the buzz: Honeybees help Delaware agriculture, ecology – Bay to Bay News

Bee-lieve the buzz: Honeybees help Delaware agriculture, ecology – Bay to Bay News

June 16, 2025
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact

© 2023 earth-news.info

No Result
View All Result

© 2023 earth-news.info

No Result
View All Result

© 2023 earth-news.info

Go to mobile version