Structure, Kinematics and Dynamics of Stellar Systems

Abstract

Karl Schwarzschild was a pioneer in stellar dynamics. His most important contribution in this field was undoubtedly the description of the velocity distribution of stars as a velocity ellipsoid [4.2,3], which is still substantially valid today, and which has been named “the Schwarzschild distribution” after him. He also indicated the way in which the relaxation time of a stellar system could be calculated from the mutual gravitational perturbations of individual stars [4.11]. Other papers concerned with stellar systems dealt with the determination of the stellar density in our Milky Way system [4.5,6,10], as well as certain additional individual queries [4.1,7-9]. He also wrote popular articles about the “System of Fixed Stars”, which give a particularly clear idea of the basic picture held by Schwarzschild [4.4].