Sociotard Posted January 14, 2009 Report Share Posted January 14, 2009 Does anybody know of a program that simulates the movements of planets in a solar system (stellar system?) you make up? I'm talking about a program in which I could arrange bodies of different masses with different positions and relative velocities, then simulate gravity and see what happens over 10,000 years. I was fooling around with one: http://phet.colorado.edu/sims/my-solar-system/my-solar-system.swf It is fun, but very limited. (It's really here for little kids) For example: there is no given correlation between the masses of the objects and real units of measurement. Likewise there are no correlations for speed, distance or time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spence Posted January 14, 2009 Report Share Posted January 14, 2009 Re: Solar system modeling software? I don't have it myself, but I have been told this is a great program AstroSynthesis™ v2.0 http://www.nbos.com/products/astro/astro.htm Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Basil Posted January 14, 2009 Report Share Posted January 14, 2009 Re: Solar system modeling software? Here's another fun but not detailed one: http://dan-ball.jp/en/javagame/planet/ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cancer Posted January 14, 2009 Report Share Posted January 14, 2009 Re: Solar system modeling software? If you say "millions of years" or "billions of years" rather than "thousands of years" then you're talking about research-grade Solar System dynamics codes, even for small numbers of initial objects. Lots of sets of initial conditions will be sort of stable for a few thousand orbits but not for millions (or more) of them. In fact, ALL planetary systems evolve over time, ejecting some bodies, accreting others, and altering all the orbits from how they began. Some of the evolution is in cyclic patterns, some isn't. There's coupling between the planets' rotations (and inclinations and shapes...) and their orbits, too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sir Ofeelya Posted January 16, 2009 Report Share Posted January 16, 2009 Re: Solar system modeling software? You could try googling "stargen" and have a look at that piece of software. Quite cool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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