Keplers Laws Lab - 2024
Keplers Laws Lab - 2024
Keplers Laws Lab - 2024
This lab has three activities, each exploring one of Kepler’s Laws of Orbital Motion. Note that
each activity has Pre-Lab activities and questions to complete before collecting data.
Learning Goals
● Explore how the velocity and position of a planet affect the shape of its orbit.
● Describe the characteristics of an ellipse and their relation to planetary
orbits.
● Relate geometric concepts with real life trajectories: solar system planets
and moons, as well as space missions and other astronomical systems.
● Discover how Kepler’s Laws apply for different bodies in the solar system
Pre-lab Activity
1. Draw the first five planetary orbits of the Solar System.
2. Suppose you want to send a space mission from Earth’s orbit to Mars. What
route do you think it should take? Draw it on your map above.
3. What are the possible shapes an orbit could have? Mark which of the
following shapes you think could be found in planetary orbits:
Triangle
Square
Ellipse
Rectangle
Parabola
Open Play
For this activity, we’ll be exploring only the First Law Screen.
Play with the PhET sim for 5 minutes: Kepler’s Laws - First Law. Play with the
settings to see what each illustrates. Click on different components of the
simulation diagram to see if you can drag them. Describe three main things you
have discovered that allow you to change things in the simulation:
●
●
●
2. Describe at least 3 ways to reach edge cases in the simulation (the orbit
becomes dashed and a warning message appears on screen). Write the
warning message and what you did to reach that orbit.
a.
b.
c.
3. In each of those situations, how would you get back to a stable orbit?
Eccentricity
Check the Eccentricity and Foci checkboxes and create different orbits. You should
see the panel below:
4. Changing the orbit, try to get the pink arrow to each object
label of the Eccentricity panel (see picture on the left).
Describe the process you used to achieve this.
5. Describe two ways to create two different orbits with the same eccentricity as
Eris.
7. What observations can you make about the Foci related to Eccentricity?
10. Use the ‘Target Orbit’ menu to recreate the orbits of the first 5 planets in
the solar system and fill the next table with their values
Target Focal
Semi-major Semi-minor
Orbit distance, c Eccentricity
axis, a (AU) axis, b (AU)
(AU)
11.Use these data which you recorded in the table to draw a more scale realistic
orbits of the first five planetary orbits of the Solar System
12.Look on the internet for the values of the other planets in the solar system,
what do you think they are not represented in the simulation?
13.Compare your drawing with the one in the pre-lab. Did you learn something
new about our solar system? Describe it
14.Look on the internet or in books the statement of Kepler’s first Law and write
it here:
a. Based on what you learned from this activity, try to explain this law to
an elementary school student using your own words. You can include
pictures and screenshots of the simulation!
Kepler’s Laws Activity: Second Law
Learning Goals
● Explore how the velocity and position of a planet affect the shape of its orbit.
● Visualize what is meant by “swept area of a planet’s orbit” and its relationship with equal
time intervals in the context of Kepler’s second Law.
● Describe the behavior of the planet's velocity in different moments of its orbit.
Pre-lab Activity
Look at the following image::
3. Order sections A, B, C and D according to the amount of time it will take the planet to go
through them.
4. Will there be a difference in the time it takes the planet to go through A+B versus D+C?
Open Play
Allow 5 min to play with the PhET sim. Kepler’s Laws - Second Law. Play with the settings to
see what each illustrates. Click on different components of the simulation diagram
to see if you can drag them. Describe three main things you have discovered that
allow you to change things in the simulation:
●
●
●
Periapsis is…
Apopasis is…
2. Look in the web for alternate names for these points, and how they are called in other
types of orbits:
3. How does the velocity change when the planet is on periapsis versus apoapsis?
4. Look on the internet or in books the statement of Kepler’s second Law and
write it here:
a. Based on what you learned from this activity, try to explain this law to an
elementary school student using your own words. You can include pictures and
screenshots of the simulation!
Kepler’s Laws Activity: Third Law
Learning Goals
● Explore the relationship between the semi-major axis and the period of an orbit, and
their corresponding powers described by the Kepler’s Third Law
Pre-lab Activity
[Note: While your textbook uses P to represent the period of an orbit, the simulation uses the
variable T instead. Anywhere you see T in the simulation or lab, it is representing the orbital
period.]
The most important measurement of an ellipse is certainly the semi-major axis represented
with the symbol a, which is the distance measured from the center to the border, along the
major axis. The name also indicates that its length is exactly half of the major axis.
1. In the above image, use a ruler to verify that the longest distance from the center is
indeed a.
2. Think of different shaped orbits. Is the orbital period related to any other property? List
the orbital elements you think influence the period.
Open Play
Allow 5 min to play with the PhET sim. Kepler’s Laws - Third Law. Play with the settings to
see what each illustrates. Click on different components of the simulation diagram
to see if you can drag them. Describe three main things you have discovered that
allow you to change things in the simulation:
●
●
●
Measuring Periods
Now we will analyze how the Period of a planetary orbit is defined, and different ways to
measure it within the simulation.
1. Based on the behavior of the Period Tool, how would you define the period of an orbit?
2. Take multiple period measurements of the same orbit. Does the starting point alter the
measurement? Explain
3. Measure the period of a circular orbit, and compare with the period of more elliptical
orbits but with the same semi-major axis:
Type Period, T (years) Semi-major axis, a (AU)
Circular
Mildly Elliptical
Highly Elliptical
4. What’s your conclusion? Does eccentricity impact the period of an orbit? If so, in what
way?
5. Now let’s make period measurements for different orbits of the solar system. Then,
calculate the relation of T/a. For this, remember to use the ‘Target Orbit’ panel to
recreate real world orbits:
Semi- T/a
Period, T
major axis, (AU/years)
(years)
a (AU)
Mercury
Earth
Semi- T/a
Period, T
major axis, (AU/years)
(years)
a (AU)
Mars
7. Find the combination of exponents for which the relation T/a remains constant
for all orbits. Include a screenshot or drawing of the graph, what shape does the graph
have now?
Period
power: Graph:
Semi-
major axis
power:
9. Use the above equation to find out what the semi-major axis of Halley's Comet is,
knowing that its period is 76 years.
10. Suppose that NASA just discovered an asteroid orbiting the sun with a semi-major axis
of 3 AU. Can you use Kepler’s Third Law to calculate its period in years?
12. Can you find the new equation for Kepler’s Third Law for a stellar system where the
star’s mass is twice as the sun’s?
Post-lab Activity
13. Look on the internet or in books the statement of Kepler’s first Law and write it here:
a. Based on what you learned from this activity, try to explain this law to an
elementary school student using your own words. You can include pictures and
screenshots of the simulation!
Note: This service is not intended for secure transactions such as banking, social media, email, or purchasing. Use at your own risk. We assume no liability whatsoever for broken pages.
Alternative Proxies: