# Tag Info

6

The current explanation for this is something called the frost line (which changes over time). At greater distances from the Sun, a body will receive less and less radiation, and so it will be colder than if it were closer to the Sun. Eventually, conditions become cold enough for volatiles to condense into grains. These volatiles make it possible for ...

2

Objects in orbit pass over the surface above what's commonly called their ground track. For objects in low earth orbit, though they go around the earth every 1.5 or more hours, the Earth rotates beneath them so they don't trace a simple "circle" over the same points on land. The orbit is around the Earth in a fixed plane, so we are likely (but not ...

2

The Earth moves in an elliptic orbit around the sun (or around the barycenter). If, in helocentric coordinates the Earth is at position (x,y), then in Geocentric coordinates the position of the sun is in position (-x,-y) So the locus of the Sun in Geocentric coordinates exactly matches the locus of the Earth in Heliocentric. The path of the sun in ...

1

The USNO Sixth Catalog of Orbits of Visual Binary Stars (ORB6) has the orbital elements you need. $\gamma$ And is WDS 02039+4220 $\alpha$ Gem is WDS 07346+3153 $\zeta$ UMa is WDS 13239+5456 Double star expert Bruce MacEvoy explains orbital elements in maybe enough detail to help you work out some state vectors. My search also turned up a book chapter by ...

Only top voted, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible