gravity sims apps i have played with

[danielost 8,881]

I have messed around with a couple of gravity apps. One in which the stars move and one where they are fixed. What I have seen is that a star system with two or more stars is not a good pace for a planet to be in. No matter how far apart the stars are the planets are eaten or flung out into space. Granted these weren't 3d sims. The other thing is in the sim where the stars are moving. Anything bigger than a binary system is also unstable, the other stars get thrown out.

It has been said that a planet can't do a figuare eight orbit around two stars. But, in the fixed star app the planets do much more complicated orbits.

I have seen them do a barrel race orbit around three stars. They have reversed orbits. They ve stayed between the two stars not orbiting either, just kind of rocking back and forth. At least for a while. I have also seen them just orbit the two stars in a normal kind of orbit. But, they all end up being eaten or throwb out of the system.

[Waspie_Dwarf 16,513]

But, they all end up being eaten or throwb out of the system.

For a long time astronomers believed that this would be the most likely outcome in reality too. It was thought that such planets were unlikely. Of course now we know that planets can and do exist around binary systems.

Kepler 16 (see HERE), Kepler 34, Kepler 35 and Kepler 47 (see HERE) are all binary systems with planets.

[danielost 8,881]

This would seem to mean either we don't know all of the rules or some force outside of nature is haveing an affect on these systems.

It would also indicate there are trillions of rogue planets out there. They may be as numerious as inhabitable planets.