Question

3) Estimate the mass of the Sun using what you know about uniform circular motion and Newton’s Universal Law of Gravitation. You can assume that one year is 365 days, the distance from the Earth to the Sun is 149.6 million km, and the Earth travels in a perfectly circular path around the Sun.

Hint: What forces contribute to the centripetal force on the Earth? If you are not sure, draw a free body diagram.

4) The Hubble Space Telescope orbits the earth at an altitude of 598 km. What is its speed? Some useful constants:

rearth = 6371 km
Mearth = 5.97 × 1024 kgG=6.67×10−11 Nm2/kg2

Answer 1