Why Do Revolving Bodies Have Elliptical Orbits?

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Revolving bodies have elliptical orbits due to the nature of gravitational forces, which create trajectories described as conic sections. Perfect circles exist only in mathematics, as real-world orbits are influenced by factors like gravitational variations. Saturn's rings consist of numerous individual bodies, each following its own slightly elliptical path, resulting in an average orbit that appears circular but is not perfect. If a satellite's trajectory is altered, such as by a meteoroid impact, its orbit can shift from circular to elliptical. Gravity is indeed the force driving the revolution of both celestial bodies and the particles within Saturn's rings.
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Why revolving bodies have their orbits elliptical and not perfectly circular (please correct me if I am wrong)?
 
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Shahin.Omar said:
Why revolving bodies have their orbits elliptical and not perfectly circular (please correct me if I am wrong)?
Is there anything in nature that is perfectly circular? Perfect circles exist in math only.
 
Because ellipses (technically, conic sections) are the trajectories of particles in a 1/r potential. If gravity had a different relation of force vs. distance, there would be different shaped orbits.
 
Vanadium 50 said:
Because ellipses (technically, conic sections) are the trajectories of particles in a 1/r potential. If gravity had a different relation of force vs. distance, there would be different shaped orbits.

Just for a comparison, and I actually wonder about it: Celestial bodies revolve around other objects due to gravity, does the same apply to Saturn's rings too (or is it just like Saturn's atmosphere)?

I was looking for an example for a circular orbit. Saturn's rings are a set of large number of bodies and they together form a perfect circular orbit.
 
If a satellite were in a circular orbit, but then it gets knocked by a meteoroid so that the direction of its tangential velocity is no longer exactly perpendicular to the direction of the gravitational force, that would make the orbit become elliptical.
 
Shahin.Omar said:
Saturn's rings are a set of large number of bodies and they together form a perfect circular orbit.
They don't have one orbit, just individual orbits which are not perfect circles. The average of the individual orbit is closer to the circle but not a perfect circle either.
 
A.T. said:
They don't have one orbit, just individual orbits which are not perfect circles. The average of the individual orbit is closer to the circle but not a perfect circle either.

Thanks for the information, and is gravity responsible for their revolution as it is for the revolution of other celestial bodies?
 

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