Artificial Lagrange Orbits

When a planet orbits a star, or a moon orbits a planet, there are Lagrange points where gravity and centrifugal acceleration (from the smaller body's orbital motion) are in equilibrium. Spacecraft and natural objects, like asteroids, may orbit these points. The thrust of a solar sail can change where equilibrium is reached, and where a spacecraft can orbit. These new artificial Lagrange orbits (ALO) enable a unique perspective for a variety of applications.

Planetary Artificial Lagrange Orbits

Solar sails enable periodic orbits displaced from the natural Sun-planet Lagrange points. [1]

Lunar Artificial Lagrange Orbits

Solar sails enabled periodic orbits displaced from the natural Lunar lagrange points. [1, 2, 3, 4]

See Also

• Geostorm

References

1. McInnes, Colin R. Solar Sailing. Springer-Praxis, Chichester, UK, 1999. BibTeX
2. Simo, J and McInnes, C R. Solar sail trajectories at the Earth-Moon Lagrange points. 59th International Astronautical Congress (IAC'08), 29 Sep - 3 Oct 2008, Glasgow, Scotland , 2008. BibTeX
3. Simo, Jules and McInnes, Colin R. Solar sail orbits at the Earth-Moon libration points. Communications in Nonlinear Science and Numerical Simulation 14(12):4191 - 4196, 2009. BibTeX
4. Simo, J and McInnes, C R. Asymptotic analysis of displaced lunar orbits. Journal of Guidance, Control and Dynamics 32(5):1666-1671, 2009. BibTeX