Circular Orbit

A circular orbit is the orbit at a fixed distance around any point by an object rotating around a fixed axis.

Below we consider a circular orbit in astrodynamics or celestial mechanics under standard assumptions. Here the centripetal force is the gravitational force, and the axis mentioned above is the line through the center of the central mass perpendicular to the plane of motion.

In this case not only the distance, but also the speed, angular speed, potential and kinetic energy are constant. There is no periapsis or apoapsis. This orbit has no radial version.

Read more about Circular Orbit:  Circular Acceleration, Velocity, Equation of Motion, Angular Speed and Orbital Period, Energy, Delta-v To Reach A Circular Orbit, Orbital Velocity in General Relativity

Famous quotes containing the words circular and/or orbit:

    Oh Lolita, you are my girl, as Vee was Poe’s and Bea Dante’s, and what little girl would not like to whirl in a circular skirt and scanties?
    Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)

    The Fitchburg Railroad touches the pond about a hundred rods south of where I dwell. I usually go to the village along its causeway, and am, as it were, related to society by this link. The men on the freight trains, who go over the whole length of the road, bow to me as to an old acquaintance, they pass me so often, and apparently they take me for an employee; and so I am. I too would fain be a track-repairer somewhere in the orbit of the earth.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)