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Derivation of Kepler's laws

How can analytically be derived the Kepler's laws?

I found some extremely synthetic equations which from the Newton's laws (in particular F = ma ) tried to obtain the Kepler's laws, but even
if it seemed to be a nice procedure they were too much incomplete.

homework-and-exercises newtonian-mechanics newtonian-gravity orbital-motion

edited Jun 13 '16 at 19:08 asked May 14 '14 at 12:40

Qmechanic BowPark
75.9k 11 117 382 290 3 16

4 Read the classics: Classical Mechanics by Goldstein, Mathematical Methods of Classical Mechanics by Arnold, and
Mechanics by Landau and Lifshitz. Goldstein is quite detailed, the other two are, in their characteristic style, not quite
so detailed. Robin Ekman May 14 '14 at 13:31

4 Answers

This is the topic of Chapter 8 of Marion & Thornton's Classical Mechanics.

Kepler's second law (equal areas in equal times) is a consequence of angular momentum
conservation,
2
= r = constant,

(with reduced mass and coordinates r and ) because the infinitesimal area swept out per
unit time is

1 2

dA = r d = dt.
2 2

This means that the time to sweep out the entire area is = 2A/ , which we'll come back to
later.

The first law comes from the equation of motion. The energy of the system is
2
1 2
1 k
E = r +
2 2 r 2 r

which you can solve for r and integrate to find r(t) . (For gravitation, the constant k = GM ,
where M is the total mass of the two interacting bodies.) Ignoring the mathematicians who cry
"that's not how differentials work!", we can use the substitution

d dt
d = dr = dr,
dt dr r

eliminate using , and find

2
(/r )dr
(r) = .


k
2
2 E +
( r 2r
2 )

The solution to this integral shows that the orbit is a conic section

2
2
2E
= 1 + cos = = 1 + .
2
r k k

Closed conic sections are ellipses with semi-major and semi-minor axes a and b related by
, and area ab . We already learned the time required to sweep out the area of the
b = a

ellipse A , and so we immediately get Kepler's third law a

3/2
.

edited May 19 '14 at 15:46 answered May 14 '14 at 13:39

rob
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21/05/2017 homework and exercises - Derivation of Kepler's laws - Physics Stack Exchange
rob
29.1k 6 52 120

Trying to follow your equations: it is up to now quite hard, but thank you so much. Maybe you are referring to
Thornton, Marion "Classical Dynamics of Particles and Systems"? BowPark May 19 '14 at 8:55

1 That's the book. Thornton apparently waited two editions and more than twenty years to re-order the names after
Marion's death. rob May 19 '14 at 11:54

I am not very familiar with this topic but here is a proof for Kepler's third law in the special
case of a circular orbit.

Considering a circular orbit, Kepler's third law states that the square of the orbital period is
proportional to the cube of the radius, i.e. T 2 r 3 .

The period of circular motion is given by:

2 r
T =
v

Square both sides gives:

2 2
2
4 r
T =
2
v

2
v
Since the acceleration of circular motion is a =
r
, we get v2 = ar . Substituting this gives:

2 2 2
2
4 r 4 r
T = =
ar a

GM m GM
By Newton's law of gravitation, F = 2
, we get a = 2
. Substituting this gives:
r r

2
2 2
r
T = 4 r
GM

2
2
4 3
T = r
GM

answered May 14 '14 at 12:57

ace
235 2 10

If rob's answer is a bit terse for you, see "A self-contained derivation of Kepler's laws
from Newton's laws", which assumes less prior knowledge and proceeds in smaller steps.
(Yes, I wrote it.)

edited May 15 '14 at 2:53 answered May 14 '14 at 15:08

Gavin R. Putland
161 4

Since the derivation of the Keppler's first law given in the other answers involves a non-trivial
integration I think it is worth to see an easier way.

Let pand Lare the momentum and angular momentum of the planet, respectively, m its mass,
K comes from the gravitational force F = K r /r
2
, and r is the radial unit vector r =
r /r .

I will define the so-called Runge-Lez vector,

p L

A = r .
mK

The square of this vector is

2 2
pL 2L
2
A = A A = 1 + .
mK 2 mK r

To get this result we need to use r = L (r p)/r

(p L)
2
= L /r . The mecanical energy is
E = p /2m K /r, so
2

2

2L E
A = 1 + .
2
mK

Since E and L are constant for any central force, we have that A is also constant. Actually it can
be show that the vector Ais also constant.

Taking the scalar product of Awith r ,

2
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21/05/2017 homework and exercises - Derivation of Kepler's laws - Physics Stack Exchange
2
L

A r = Ar cos = r.
mK

Solving for r and plugging the value of A we get

2
L /mK
r = .
2

2L E
1 + 1 + cos
mK
2

This is just the polar representation of a conic section of eccentricity 2L E

1 + . 2
mK

edited Jul 6 '16 at 23:52 answered Jul 6 '16 at 23:47

Diracology
8,317 2 22 52

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