Abstract
We present numerical results of the so-called Sitnikov-problem, a special case of the three-dimensional elliptic restricted three-body problem. Here the two primaries have equal masses and the third body moves perpendicular to the plane of the primaries' orbit through their barycenter. The circular problem is integrable through elliptic integrals; the elliptic case offers a surprisingly great variety of motions which are until now not very well known. Very interesting work was done by J. Moser in connection with the original Sitnikov-paper itself, but the results are only valid for special types of orbits. As the perturbation approach needs to have small parameters in the system we took in our experiments as initial conditions for the work moderate eccentricities for the primaries' orbit (0.33≤e primaries ≤0.66) and also a range of initial conditions for the distance of the 3rd body (= the planet) from very close to the primaries orbital plane of motion up to distance 2 times the semi-major axes of their orbit. To visualize the complexity of motions we present some special orbits and show also the development of Poincaré surfaces of section with the eccentricity as a parameter. Finally a table shows the structure of phase space for these moderately chosen eccentricities.
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Dvorak, R. Numerical results to the Sitnikov-problem. Celestial Mech Dyn Astr 56, 71–80 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00699721
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00699721