Sources of Eccentricity in Trinary Systems

Eccentricity generation in hierarchical triple systems with non-coplanar and initially circular orbits

Authors:

Georgakarakos et al

Abstract:

In a previous paper, we developed a technique for estimating the inner eccentricity in coplanar hierarchical triple systems on initially circular orbits, with comparable masses and with well separated components, based on an expansion of the rate of change of the Runge-Lenz vector. Now, the same technique is extended to non-coplanar orbits. However, it can only be applied to systems with I0 less than 39.23∘ or I0 greater than 140.77∘, where I is the inclination of the two orbits, because of complications arising from the so-called 'Kozai effect'. The theoretical model is tested against results from numerical integrations of the full equations of motion.