Related papers: Hierarchical Eclipses
HS Hydrae is a short period eclipsing binary (P_orb=1.57 day) that belongs to a rare group of systems observed to have rapidly changing inclinations. This evolution is due to a third star on an intermediate orbit, and results in significant…
Stellar obliquity, the angle between a planet's orbital axis and its host star's spin axis, traces the formation and evolution of a planetary system. In transiting exoplanet observations, only the sky-projected stellar obliquity can be…
The apparent positions of planets are determined by means of the fundamental ephemerides, the precession-nutation models of the Earth, the gravitational effects and aberrations et al. Around 2000, many astrometrical conceptions, models and…
The Earth's obliquity is stabilized by the Moon, which facilitates a rapid precession of the Earth's spin-axis, de-tuning the system away from resonance with orbital modulation. It is however, likely that the architecture of the Solar…
We present and analyze epsilon Aurigae data concerning the evolution of the H$\alpha$ line on the occasion of the 2009 International observation campaign launched to cover the eclipse of this object. About 250 high resolution spectra of the…
Second part of a didactic sequence of activities on some topics of Astronomy, related mainly with the real shape of the Earth, the gravitational interactions between our planet and other celestial bodies, and the resulting movement of the…
According to the hierarchical clustering scenario, galaxies like the Milky Way form hierarchically, and many supporting evidences have been found in the Galactic halo. However, most stars in the Milky Way are disk stars. Disk stars have…
The recurrence of a previously documented eclipse of a solar-like pre--main-sequence star in the young cluster IC 348 has been observed. The recurrence interval is 4.7 $\pm 0.1$ yr and portions of 4 cycles have now been seen. The duration…
Due to the foreground extinction of the Milky Way, galaxies appear increasingly fainter the closer they lie to the Galactic Equator, creating a "zone of avoidance" of about 25% in the distribution of optically visible galaxies. A…
As a result of resonance overlap, planetary systems can exhibit chaotic motion. Planetary chaos has been studied extensively in the Hamiltonian framework, however, the presence of chaotic motion in systems where dissipative effects are…
When a medium composed of microscopic elements is subjected to a high intensity field, the individual behaviors of microscopic elements can become chaotic. In such cases it is important to consider the effects of this irregularity at…
The eclipsing binary DI Herculis garnered interest for several decades because of an apparent disagreement between the observed and calculated values of the apsidal precession rate. The problem was resolved when both stars were found to…
Tidal effects have long ago locked the Moon in synchronous rotation with the Earth and progressively increase the Earth-Moon distance. This "tidal acceleration" hinges on dissipation. Binaries containing black holes may also be tidally…
We study the secular gravitational dynamics of quadruple systems consisting of a hierarchical triple system orbited by a fourth body. These systems can be decomposed into three binary systems with increasing semimajor axes, binaries A, B…
In a variety of astronomical situations, there is a relatively high probability that a single isolated lens will produce a detectable event. The high probability is caused by some combination of a large Einstein angle, fast angular motion,…
Stationary observers in static spacetimes see falling objects spread exponentially fast, or fast-scramble, near event horizons. We generalize this picture to arbitrary cosmological horizons. We give examples of exponential fast-scrambling…
Epsilon Aurigae is a complicated binary star that undergoes optical eclipses every 27 years, including the present year. An update is given here on the array of photometric and spectroscopic observations underway, thanks to the eclipse…
Numerical simulations carried out over the past decade suggest that the orbits of the Global Navigation Satellite Systems are unstable, resulting in an apparent chaotic growth of the eccentricity. Here we show that the irregular and…
Galaxies are complex systems the evolution of which apparently results from the interplay of dynamics, star formation, chemical enrichment, and feedback from supernova explosions and supermassive black holes. The hierarchical theory of…
Three-dimensional gravitational cloaking is known to require exotic matter and energy sources, which makes it arguably physically unrealizable. On the other hand, typical astronomical observations are performed using one-dimensional…