Second Order Perturbations of Elliptic Elements with Respect to the Initial Ones

Abstract

AbstractThe following paper is devoted to the theoretical exposition of the obtention of second order perturbations of elliptic elements and is a follow-up of previous papers (Marco et al., 1996; Marco et al., 1997) where the hypothesis was made that the matrix of the partial derivatives of the orbital elements with respect to the initial ones is the identity matrix at the initial instant only. So, we must compute them through the integration of Lagrange planetary equations and their partial derivatives.Such developments have been applied to the individual corrections of orbits together with the correction of the reference system through the minimization of a quadratic form obtained from the linearized residual. In this state two new targets emerged: 1.To be sure that the most suitable quadratic form was to be considered.2.To provide a wider vision of the behavior of the different orbital parameters in time.Both aims may be accomplished through the consideration of the second order partial derivatives of the elliptic orbital elements with respect to the initial ones.