AST101H1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 6: Elipse, Semi-Major And Semi-Minor Axes, V Speeds

• School: UTSG
• Department: Astronomy & Astrophysics
• Course: AST101H1
• Professor: Michael Reid

Document Summary

Ast101 lecture 6 gravity and orbits (part 1) A physical body of mass that exerts force on an object and as result, the object is attracted toward the body. The speed at which an object travels determine the trajectory it will maintain. If a ball is simply dropped above the earth"s north pole, it will be attracted to the. Earth due to earth"s gravitational pull and fall. This is called a free-fall, where gravity alone influences the path of the object. If a ball is thrown in a direction at some speed, it will be attracted to the earth and land elsewhere from its initial position above earth. Rather, it maintains its trajectory because at that instantaneous speed, the earth"s gravitational pull helps it complete an orbit. This creates the ball"s orbital path: the ball can travel at different speeds, thus creating different orbital path, the speed at which the ball breaks free" from the earth"s gravitational pull due to.