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astronomical visualization software
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dharder
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Oct 15, 2009 09:32 PDT
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I exercised some of the features of ‘Solar System Live’. Not bad for
free, yet it seems to lack some functionality which I found useful about
‘Dance of the Planets’. Dance allows one to pan the field of view and
enlarge. One can also include the orbits of comets, which is useful
when performing a comprehensive study of Tuguska—one can check out Enke,
which some have argued was the source of an incoming iceball.
I have also used the near-Earth view to visualize the trajectory of a
shallow angle incoming geometeor, following the path of the conjunction
arc over Yakutia, as Central Siberia rotates into view. Pursuing a
far-out hunch, I also checked the position of Jupiter’s moons at, and
hours following the time of the Tunguska event, with respect to the
orbital plane and with respect to the conjunction arc—Dance has that
functionality. I think one can even include the asteroid belt in the
simulations.
Although Dance is an adequate choice for curious astronomers who demand
accuracy, it does lack something I would really like to have—pattern
recognition. I would like to be able to log in a particular system
configuration, set an alignment ‘window of acceptance’, and have the
software run the simulation through time searching for and logging
recurrences. I cannot do that, and it is frustrating!
I didn’t pay much attention to the position of Uranus or Neptune, i.e.
the outer solar system, because the outer giants were significantly
outside of Jupiter’s orbital plane on 1/7/1908 @ 00:17 UTC—using Solar
System Live check their declination. Also check the declination of
Mercury and Venus. Note that they were close to Jupiter’s plane. That
is what was of particular interest to me.
The Earth crosses Jupiter’s orbital plane twice a year, on about June 30
and New Years Eve, so the Earth was close to Jupiter’s orbital plane at
the time of Tunguska—the inner system went into arc-conjuction on a
jovian spiral, with the Earth very close to Jupiter’s orbital plane, and
with the sun in flare mode. That gravitational/electromagnetic
configuration of events is particularly rare!
Faustweb.net is also free solar system simulation software available on
the web. Input into Faust the Tunguska date and time. Faust also shows
the position of the moon in the arc. Technically, you would be correct
if you were to say that new moon came at 16:33 UTC on June 28, however,
Faust shows that the moon completes the arc of conjuction near the time
of Tunguska. Faust doesn’t have the time resolution which Dance does,
and yet the synchronicity of arc conjunction at Tunguska time is
unmistakable!
Expand the field of view in Faust to include Jupiter. Mentally draw a
jovian spiral through the arc conjunction and out to Jupiter. That
intrigues me from a magnetic standpoint. Yes, expand the field of view
further to include Uranus and Neptune, and fit a straight line through
all the bodies. I cannot deny that is also interesting, from a
gravitational/angular momentum standpoint. Certainly solar system
gravitational/angular momentum and electromagnetic goings on are
coupled.
The Earth’s north and south magnetic poles are offset from the spin axis
of the Earth. In other words, the mechanical moment vector and the
magnetic dipole moment vector are not collinear. Geomagnetists will
tell you that the reason for that lies in the fluid dynamics of the
Earth’s outer core—at the heart of the geodynamo. It is logical to
imagine that the mechanical moment and the dipole moment for the solar
system are also not collinear.
Rigorously, the moment of inertia for the solar system would involve an
integration of all mass components—the solar structure, the planets, the
asteroid belt, the comets, etc.—and of course their distance from the
axis of gyration is important in the computation.
Considering the mass of the sun with respect to all other mass in the
system, the net mechanical moment vector would likely lie within the
confines of the sun. The dipole moment of our solar system would
involve a similar integration of distributed charge and flux components,
and one might expect the net dipole moment vector to also lie within the
confines of the sun.
Of the planets, Jupiter will have the largest effect on both vectors,
which undoubtedly affects the goings on in the heliodynamo, which in
turn will affect the goings on in the geodynamo due to coupling.
Jupiter’s effect on the heliodynamo is conspicuous in the correlation
between its orbital period and the periodicity of the sunspot cycle.
My point is, that at the time of Tunguska, there was synchronous
coordination of angular momentum and electromagnetic system components
which made a discrete adjustment to the geomagnetic field, as if on
schedule!
DAH 10/15/09
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