English

Determination of Earth's Orbital Parameters Using Doppler Measurements

Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics 2026-07-23 v1

Abstract

Precision determinations of the parameters of Earth's orbit around the Sun using methods based on the Doppler shift of 21-cm emissions from the galaxy and the repetition rate of pulsar J0332+5434 are reported. The observed values and statistical errors for the orbital parameters for the 21-cm observations are semi-major axis a=1.00020±0.00015 aua = 1.00020 \pm 0.00015~{\rm au} and eccentricity e=0.017077±0.000077e= 0.017077 \pm 0.000077. For the pulsar observations, the observed values are a=1.000034±0.000034 aua = 1.000034 \pm 0.000034~{\rm au} and e=0.016667±0.000017e=0.016667 \pm 0.000017. The observations are based on a year-long campaign of daily drift-scan observations using a 12.8-m parabolic antenna and a receiver chain tuned to the 21-cm frequency band. The data used in the analysis are available for use in educational exercises in the supplementary material

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2607.21812,
  title  = {Determination of Earth's Orbital Parameters Using Doppler Measurements},
  author = {Gary Atkins and Marcus Leech and Daniel Marlow and Doug Yuill},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2607.21812},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

6 pages, 9 figures, This article has been submitted to the American Journal of Physics