Yale Astronomers Solve Old Three‐Body Problem Available to Purchase

Complete solution of the Pythagorean three‐body problem shows a final configuration in which two of the bodies form a close binary system and the third moves away to infinity. Victor Szebehely and C. Frederick Peters of the Yale Observatory have succeeded in solving the problem and have published their results in the Astronomical Journal (72, 876, 1967). Recent extensions of their work show a nearby periodic solution and the way to handle more than three bodies.