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Circular Orbits under Central Forces in Special Relativity

Physics Education 2016-08-16 v1 Classical Physics

Abstract

We discuss the existence and stability of circular orbits of a relativistic point particle moving in a central force field. The stability condition is somewhat more restrictive in Special Relativity. In the particular case of attractive central force fields proportional to 1/rn1/r^n, we find the values the angular momentum may have in circular orbits and show that, unlike in the non-relativistic limit, the latter are not always stable in Special Relativity for 2<n<32<n<3.

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Cite

@article{arxiv.physics/0407049,
  title  = {Circular Orbits under Central Forces in Special Relativity},
  author = {J M Aguirregabiria and A Hernández and M Rivas},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:physics/0407049},
  year   = {2016}
}

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7 pages, 0 figures