What causes Earth's climate to change? What happens if the Earth leaves its orbit? What could cause the earth's orbit to change?

What causes Earth's climate to change? What happens if the Earth leaves its orbit? What could cause the earth's orbit to change?
change in the inclination of the planets' orbit, change in the inclination of the electron's orbit
Change in orbital inclination artificial satellite - an orbital maneuver, the purpose of which (in the general case) is to transfer the satellite into an orbit with a different inclination. There are two types of this maneuver:
  1. Change in orbital inclination towards the equator. It is produced by turning on the rocket engine in the ascending node of the orbit (above the equator). The pulse is issued in a direction perpendicular to the direction of the orbital velocity;
  2. Changing the position (longitude) of the ascending node on the equator. Produced by turning on the rocket engine above the pole (in the case of a polar orbit). The impulse, as in the previous case, is issued in a direction perpendicular to the direction of the orbital velocity. As a result, the ascending node of the orbit shifts along the equator, and the inclination of the orbital plane to the equator remains unchanged.

Changing the inclination of the orbit is an extremely energy-consuming maneuver. Thus, for satellites in low orbit (having an orbital speed of about 8 km/s), changing the inclination of the orbit to the equator by 45 degrees will require approximately the same energy (increment in characteristic speed) as for insertion into orbit - about 8 km/s. For comparison, it can be noted that the energy capabilities of the Space Shuttle make it possible, with full use of the onboard fuel reserve (about 22 tons: 8.174 kg of fuel and 13.486 kg of oxidizer in the orbital maneuvering engines), to change the value of the orbital speed by only 300 m/s, and the inclination, accordingly (during a maneuver in a low circular orbit) is approximately 2 degrees. For this reason, artificial satellites are launched (if possible) directly into orbit with the target inclination.

In some cases, however, a change in orbital inclination is still inevitable. Thus, when launching satellites into geostationary orbit from high-latitude cosmodromes (for example, Baikonur), since it is impossible to immediately place the device into an orbit with an inclination less than the latitude of the cosmodrome, a change in orbital inclination is used. The satellite is launched into a low reference orbit, after which several intermediate, higher orbits are sequentially formed. The energy capabilities required for this are provided by the upper stage installed on the launch vehicle. The inclination change is carried out at the apogee of a high elliptical orbit, since the speed of the satellite at this point is relatively low, and the maneuver requires less energy (compared to a similar maneuver in a low circular orbit).

Calculation of energy costs for the orbital inclination change maneuver

The calculation of the speed increment () required to carry out the maneuver is calculated using the formula:

  • - eccentricity
  • - periapsis argument
  • - true anomaly
  • - era
  • - major axle shaft

Notes

  1. NASA. Propellant Storage and Distribution. NASA (1998). Retrieved February 8, 2008. Archived from the original on August 30, 2012.
  2. Spacecraft Fuel
  3. Spacecraft motion control, M. Knowledge. Cosmonautics, Astronomy - B.V. Rauschenbach (1986).

change in the inclination of the earth's orbit, change in the inclination of the orbit of the planets, change in the inclination of the electron's orbit

Every 405 thousand years, the Earth's orbit lengthens, leading to mass extinctions.

Scientists from Rutgers University have concluded that every 405 thousand years, the Earth's orbit lengthens due to the influence of gravity from Jupiter and Venus, which leads to climate change on the planet and mass extinctions, reports.

The 405 thousand year cycle was predicted based on calculations of planetary motion and spans approximately 215 million years. Also, changes in the location of the planet’s magnetic poles are associated with the degree of deviation from the circle of the Earth’s orbit.

Scientists obtained detailed data on changes in the direction of the magnetic field after analyzing sediments in the Newark Rift Basin (New Jersey, USA) and sedimentary rocks in the Chinle Formation geological formation.

The resulting samples contained zircon minerals interspersed with magnetite, which can be used to judge the state of the planet’s magnetic field.

The results obtained were consistent with theoretical calculations, which allows the cycle to be used for more accurate dating of events occurring on Earth, including the Triassic-Jurassic extinction, when a large number of animal species disappeared, freeing up ecological niches for dinosaurs.

Earth's orbit- the trajectory of the Earth around the Sun at an average distance of about 150 million kilometers (152,098,238 km at aphelion, 147,098,290 km at perihelion). The orbit has an elliptical shape. One revolution, the so-called sidereal year, lasts 365.2564 days. The orbit is more than 940 million km long. The Earth's barycenter moves from west to east with an average speed of 29.783 km/s or 107,218 km/h.

The inclination of the Earth's rotation axis - the angle between the planes of the equator of a celestial body and its orbit - is equal to 23.439281

Fluctuations in Earth's orbit could lead to a new ice age: scientists

The Earth's orbit changes periodically due to the planet's own vibrations, as well as gravitational forces. This has led to large-scale climate changes in the past and may occur again in the future.

Scientists are convinced that Earth's orbital variations, such as the planet's wobbles and tilts on its axis of rotation, as well as its rhythmic lengthening of its orbital shape, influence the shape of the seafloor on Earth.

According to a report by geology experts at Harvard University, scientists already knew that orbital fluctuations, provoked by the gravitational interaction between the Sun and the planets of the solar system, can often reach such proportions that it leads to the occurrence of so-called ice ages. This has happened at least twice on Earth.

During ice age cycles, much of the water turns into ice and is then redistributed between the oceans. Ultimately, the ice warms back up and turns into water, which can lead to changes in global sea levels of up to 200 meters. These same cycles change pressure on the ocean floor and trigger impacts on Earth's magma.

Now a team of Harvard scientists has also found that, in reality, seafloor changes occur not only during and after the Ice Age, but also between them. According to calculations by experts, planetary fluctuations directly affect the amount of oceanic crust, which can vary in thickness up to 1 km. Experts have also found that changes in the crust entail a displacement of ocean ridges and nearby areas.

Thus, experts have revealed that the Strait of Juan de Fuca, separating the south of Vancouver Island from the northwestern part of Washington state in the North Pacific Ocean, was created precisely due to the movement of the bottom during the interglacial period. Its length is 153 km. It has been in the process of formation for the last 1 million years, and it was orbital fluctuations that contributed to its appearance in its current form.

There are many movies about disasters. We know what awaits us if asteroids hit the planet, if tidal waves hit New York, or if a cruise ship suddenly capsizes and/or is attacked by a sea monster.

Unfortunately, by focusing our attention on these unlikely disasters, film directors have neglected the most unlikely catastrophes.

What will happen if the moon disappears?

What would happen if the Moon simply ceased to exist? The first natural phenomenon that will cease to operate is the ebb and flow of the tides. Ocean tides occur due to the gravitational force between the Earth and the Moon, their movement relative to each other. The sudden disappearance of the Moon would completely overturn this system. There will be some movement. Waves will still roll onto the western coasts of the continents due to the rotation of the Earth.

Or at least it will be at first, as what happens on Earth becomes unpredictable. Having lost the Moon, the Earth will begin to move unstably, like a children's toy spinning top, which, losing its rotation speed, sways, but does not fall yet. This will be a terrible ride! The Earth will move either, rotating perpendicular to the plane of its orbit (in other words, one of the hemispheres, southern or northern, will always be on the sunny side, while the other hemisphere will be in constant darkness), then rotating almost parallel to the orbital plane (which will lead to the disappearance of the seasons, since all days will last the same length).

The deadly precession will continue long enough to kill the last remaining humans. While it lasts, ordinary natural disasters will not let us get bored. The moon exerts a gravitational influence on both land and sea, and, according to some, it is the cause of the movement of continents.

As a result, there will be a surge in volcanic activity and earthquakes. At the same time, all plants and animals whose periods of reproduction and migration depend on the lunar cycle will be completely confused. The shock to fish, bird and insect populations will cause deformations in local ecological systems and lead to famine and the collapse of society.

In addition, the nights will be darker - and it will be even more difficult to see.

What happens if the Earth stops rotating?

How important is the Earth's rotation on its axis? For centuries, no one cared whether it rotated at all.

Exactly what happens depends on how quickly the Earth stops spinning. If it stops rotating instantly, everything that is not attached to it will fly away to the east. (Anything that is secured will probably split in two). Survival will depend on how close you are to the pole (so if at the equator you are carried east at a speed of almost 1610 km/h, then the closer you are to the poles, the slower the speed will be).

If the Earth's rotation slows down over several weeks, more people will experience the incipient loss of propulsion. It would be better for them to accurately calculate in what position the Earth will stop and rush as fast as they can to the border between light and darkness. Stopping the Earth's rotation would mean the end of the cycle of day and night. Half the world would be constantly facing the sun, and the other half would be plunged into eternal darkness.

One small but very interesting consequence of stopping the Earth's rotation: everything on the planet will become a little heavier. The rotation of the earth exposes us to centrifugal force - a constant push outward, similar to what we feel while sitting in a car when it turns sharply. This outward force reduces our “weight” by approximately one hundred and forty-two grams for every forty-five kilograms of weight. Unless we get blown away, we will have a harder time than ever moving around and moving things around on Earth.

The effect of centrifugal force is felt most at the equator. And this is felt not only by humans, but also by water. Because centrifugal force opposes gravity, water accumulates higher at the equator. In the middle part of the Earth there is a bulge of water, which, when the Earth’s rotation stops, is eliminated by a decline in the water level, which will flow towards the poles. If it does not freeze and the flow is rapid, the water will flood vast areas of the world to the north and south, while exposing the land in the equator region.

Therefore, if you want to survive, head to the middle part of the planet.

What happens if the Earth's orbit changes significantly?

It depends on how dramatically the orbit changes. The zone suitable for the existence of life in our solar system is located between one hundred and forty-two million kilometers and two hundred and four point four million kilometers from the Sun. Since we are now almost 150 million kilometers away from the star, it becomes clear that we would prefer to move away rather than closer if the choice were ours.

It is difficult to imagine that it would be possible to deviate eight million kilometers from course, but of all the unlikely cataclysms, this is the most possible. It seems that past mass extinctions were associated with changes in climate caused by changes in the Earth's orbit. Lower temperatures and varying amounts of precipitation lead to changes in vegetation and habitat conditions, which causes the death of mammals, from large species to rodents. The end of the world is not in sight. People are resourceful and will come up with something.

And this change brings some hope and fear at the same time. The Earth's movement is not as stable as one might assume. Throughout its existence, the Earth alternately moves around the sun, either in an ellipse or in a circle. The tilt of the Earth's axis fluctuates between 22.1 and 24.5 degrees (much less than if it had lost the Moon).

About 23 million years ago, the Earth moved around the Sun strictly in a circle, and its axis had a slight tilt. Scientists say the rotation resulted in favorable seasons, small differences between maximum and minimum temperatures, and a change in the shape of the ice sheet over Antarctica may have prevented the spread of global warming.

Such encouraging news is now being taken seriously by astronomers. Some propose using the gravitational pull of asteroids to push the Earth into a better orbit. This could solve all our climate change problems! There is only one “but”: we can lose the Moon.

What causes Earth's climate to change?

Astronomer Milutin Milankovich (1879-1958) studied changes in the Earth's orbit around the Sun and the tilt of our planet's axis. He suggested that cyclical changes between them are the cause of long-term climate change.

Climate change is a complex process and is influenced by many factors. The main one is the relationship between the Earth and the Sun.

Milankovic studied three factors:

    Change in the tilt of the earth's axis;

    Deviations in the shape of the Earth's orbit around the Sun;

    The precession of the change in the position of the axis tilt relative to the orbit..


The earth's axis is not perpendicular to the plane of its orbit. The inclination is 23.5°. This gives the Northern Hemisphere the opportunity to receive more sunshine and longer days in June. In December there is less sun and the days get shorter. This explains the change of seasons. In the Southern Hemisphere, the seasons run in reverse order.

Deviation of the earth's axis.

Changing the Earth's orbit.


Earth

Earth without seasons, axis tilt 0°.


End of June: summer in the Northern Hemisphere, winter in the Southern.


Late December: summer in the Northern Hemisphere, winter in the Southern.

Earth's axis tilt

If there were no axis tilt, then we would not have seasons, and day and night would last the same throughout the year. The amount of solar energy reaching a certain point on Earth would be constant. Now the planet's axis is at an angle of 23.5°. In the summer (from June) in the Northern Hemisphere, it turns out that northern latitudes receive more light than southern latitudes. The days are getting longer and the position of the sun is getting higher. At the same time, it is winter in the Southern Hemisphere. The days are shorter and the sun is lower.

WITH After six months the Earth moves in its orbit to the opposite side of the Sun. The slope remains the same. It's summer in the Southern Hemisphere, the days are longer and there's more light. It's winter in the Northern Hemisphere.

Milanković suggested that the tilt of the earth's axis is not always 23.5°. Fluctuations occur from time to time. He calculated that the changes ranged from 22.1° to 24.5°, repeating over a period of 41,000 years. When the slope is less, the temperature in summer is lower than usual, and in winter it is higher. As the slope increases, more extreme climate conditions are observed.

How does all this affect the climate? Even as temperatures increase, winter is still cold enough for snow in areas far from the equator. If the summer is cold, then it is possible that snow in winter at high latitudes will also melt more slowly. Year after year it will be layered, forming a glacier.

Compared to water and land, snow reflects more solar energy into space, causing additional cooling. From this point of view, there is a positive feedback mechanism at work here. As temperatures drop, snow additionally accumulates and glaciers increase. Reflection increases over time and temperature decreases, and so on. Perhaps this is how the ice ages began.

Shape of the Earth's orbit around the Sun

The second factor Milankovitch studies is the shape of the Earth's orbit around the Sun. The orbit is not perfectly round. At certain times of the year, the Earth is closer to the Sun than usual. The Earth receives significantly more energy from the Sun when it is as close as possible to the star (at the perihelion point), in comparison with its maximum distance (the aphelion point).

The shape of the Earth's orbit changes cyclically with periods of 90,000 and 100,000 years. Sometimes the shape becomes more elongated (elliptical) than it is now, so the difference in the amount of solar energy received at perihelion and aphelion will be greater.

Perihelion is currently observed in January, aphelion in July. This change makes the climate of the Northern Hemisphere milder, bringing additional warmth in winter. In the Southern Hemisphere, the climate is more severe than it would be if the Earth's orbit around the Sun were circular.

Precession

There is another difficulty. The orientation of the earth's axis changes over time. Like a top, the axis moves in a circle. This movement is called precessional. The cycle of such movement is 22,000 years. This causes the seasons to gradually change. Eleven thousand years ago, the Northern Hemisphere was tilted closer to the sun in December than in June. Winter and summer changed places. 11,000 years later, everything has changed again.

All three factors: axial tilt, orbital shape and precession change the planet's climate. Since this occurs on different time scales, the interaction of these factors is complex. Sometimes they enhance each other's effect, sometimes they weaken each other. For example, 11,000 years ago, precession caused the onset of summer in the Northern Hemisphere in December, the effect of increasing solar radiation at perihelion in January and decreasing at aphelion in July would increase the interseasonal difference in the Northern Hemisphere, instead of the softening we are now accustomed to. Not everything is as simple as it seems, since the dates of perihelion and aphelion also shift.

Other factors influencing climate

Besides the effect of shifting the Earth's motion, are there other factors influencing climate?

Orbital maneuvering with changes in the orbital plane is possible in practice only on a very limited scale.

Let us assume that we want to rotate the orbital plane by an angle a around the line connecting the satellite at some point in time with the center of the Earth, and we do not want to change either the size or shape of the orbit. If the orbit is circular or the satellite is in this

the moment is at perigee or apogee; for such an operation it is enough to rotate the velocity vector by the same angle a. From an isosceles triangle of velocities it is easy to find an additional velocity impulse

where is the orbital speed. To turn an equatorial circular orbit into a polar one, you need to add speed, i.e. parabolic! With the necessary fuel reserves, such a satellite could fly from low Earth orbit to the Moon or Mars, land there and then return to Earth!

Let's try to solve our problem in a roundabout way. Let's transfer the satellite using an onboard engine from a circular orbit to a very elongated elliptical one (like orbit 4 in Fig. 17). The speed at its apogee is negligible and turning it to any angle costs nothing (at “infinity” the impulse of transition to a new plane of motion is zero). At the moment of returning to the starting point from the original orbit, it will be necessary to slow down the movement to a circular speed. The longer the elliptical orbit, the smaller the sum of the three velocity pulses. In the limit it is equal

which in the case of the initial height will be approximately also not so small (enough to land on the Moon!).

For small rotation angles a, there is no point in going “through infinity.” The benefit will be detected starting from a certain angle a, which for a circular orbit is determined from the equation

where The disadvantage of the “transition through infinity” (“biparabolic transition”, as they also say) is the “infinitely long” operation time: in the case of flying beyond the lunar orbit, it exceeds 10 days.

Transition through infinity may turn out to be practically beneficial if we are talking not only about changing the inclination of the orbit, but also at the same time about its ascent, in particular if it is required

transfer the satellite from a low orbit, strongly inclined towards the equator, to a stationary orbit. In this case, a three-pulse transition may turn out to be more advantageous than a two-pulse transition, despite the fact that the radius of the stationary orbit is significantly less than the critical radius. This benefit is detected if the inclination of the low initial orbit is greater than 38.6°

For inclination, the sum of impulses when passing through infinity in the case of starting from an initial orbit of radius is equal to If the apogee distance at which the second impulse is reported (point B in Fig. 36) is equal, then the sum of impulses exceeds the indicated value by The entire operation requires approximately 11 days)