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Journal of Undergraduate Research

Keywords

chaotic scattering, general relativity, gravitational three-body

College

Physical and Mathematical Sciences

Department

Physics and Astronomy

Abstract

I. Introduction Our research is on the gravitational three-body problem where there are three star-like objects with the only acting force on the objects being gravity. Since the discovery of gravity, many physicists and mathematicians have looked for an analytic solution to the three-body problem including Poincare, Euler, Lagrange, and Jacobi. We now know that there is in fact no analytic solution to this problem. Due to the advent of high performance computing we have discovered much about the chaotic nature1 of this problem and its sensitivity to initial perturbations. For our research we have extended the scope of the three-body problem to general relativity. Our hope for this research is to understand how multiple body systems and general relativity affect black hole formation in regions like galactic centers.

Included in

Physics Commons

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