MODEL OF UNIVERSE

BY
BRAHE AND KEPLER
 TYCHO BRAHE (1546-1601)
From a rich Danish noble family,
Tycho built vast instruments to
was fascinated by astronomy, but
set accurate sights on the stars,
disappointed with the accuracy of
and used multiple clocks and
tables of planetary motion at the
timekeepers. He achieved his
time. He decided to dedicate his
goal of measuring to one
life and considerable resources to
minute of arc. This was a
recording planetary positions ten
tremendous feat before the
times more accurately than the
invention of the telescope. His
best previous work.
aim was to confirm his own
picture of the universe, which
The king of Denmark is interested
was that the Earth was at rest,
in the stars so he gave Tycho the
the sun went around the Earth
Island of Hveen to carry out his
and the planets all went around
work.
the sun - an intermediate
picture between Ptolemy and
Copernicus.
He came up with his own compromise model of the universe.
Johannes Kepler (1571-1630)
 believed in Copernicus' picture. Having
been raised in the Greek geometric
tradition, he believed God must have had
some geometric reason for placing the six
planets at the particular distances from the
sun that they occupied. He thought of their
orbits as being on spheres, one inside the
other. One day, he suddenly remembered
that there were just five perfect Platonic
solids, and this gave a reason for there
being six planets - the orbit spheres were
maybe just such that between two
successive ones a perfect solid would just
fit. He convinced himself that, given the
uncertainties of observation at the time, this
picture might be the right one.
However, that was before Tycho's results were used. Kepler realized that Tycho's work
could settle the question one way or the other, so he went to work with Tycho in 1600.
Tycho died the next year, Kepler stole the data, and worked with it for nine years.
He reluctantly concluded that his geometric scheme was wrong. In its place, he found
his three laws of planetary motion:
 I The planets move in elliptical orbits with the sun at a focus.
 II In their orbits around the sun, the planets sweep out equal areas in equal times.
 III The squares of the times to complete one orbit are proportional to the cubes of the
average distances from the sun.
These are the laws that Newton was able to use to establish universal gravitation.
Kepler was the first to state clearly that the way to understand the motion of the planets
was in terms of some kind of force from the sun. However, in contrast to Galileo, Kepler
thought that a continuous force was necessary to maintain motion, so he visualized the
force from the sun like a rotating spoke pushing the planet around its orbit.
On the other hand, Kepler did get right that the tides were caused by the Moon's
gravity. Galileo mocked him for this suggestion.
 Kepler’s Laws of Planetary Motion
 While Copernicus rightly observed that the planets revolve around the Sun, it was
Kepler who correctly defined their orbits.
 At the age of 27, Kepler became the assistant of a wealthy astronomer, Tycho Brahe,
who asked him to define the orbit of Mars. Brahe had collected a lifetime of
astronomical observations, which, on his death, passed into Kepler’s hands. (Brahe,
who had his own Earth-centered model of the Universe, withheld the bulk of his
observations from Kepler at least in part because he did not want Kepler to use them
to prove Copernican theory correct.) Using these observations, Kepler found that the
orbits of the planets followed three laws.
 Eventually, however, Kepler noticed that an imaginary line drawn from a planet to the
Sun swept out an equal area of space in equal times, regardless of where the planet
was in its orbit. If you draw a triangle out from the Sun to a planet’s position at one
point in time and its position at a fixed time later—say, 5 hours, or 2 days—the area of
that triangle is always the same, anywhere in the orbit. For all these triangles to have
the same area, the planet must move more quickly when it is near the Sun, but more
slowly when it is farthest from the Sun.
 This discovery (which became Kepler’s second law of orbital motion) led to the
realization of what became Kepler’s first law: that the planets move in an ellipse (a
squashed circle) with the Sun at one focus point, offset from the center.

Kepler’s third law shows that there is a precise

mathematical relationship between a planet’s distance
from the Sun and the amount of time it takes revolve
around the Sun. It was this law that inspired Newton, who
came up with three laws of his own to explain why the
planets move as they do.
 Newton’s Laws of Motion
 Law I. Every body perseveres in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a right line,
unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed theron.
 In essence, a moving object won’t change speed or direction, nor will a still object
start moving, unless some outside force acts on it. The law is regularly summed up in
one word: inertia.
 Law II. The alteration of motion is ever proportional to the motive force impressed; and
is made in the direction of the right line in which that force is impressed.
 Newton’s second law is most recognizable in its mathematical form, the iconic
equation: F=ma. The strength of the force (F) is defined by how much it changes the
motion (acceleration, a) of an object with some mass (m).
 Law III. To every action there is always opposed an equal reaction: or the mutual
actions of two bodies upon each other are always equal, and directed to contrary
parts.
 As Newton himself described: “If you press a stone with your finger, the finger is also
pressed by the stone.”
Thank you~
 QUIZ
SET A
1. It is the Island that the King of Denmark gave to Brahe to carry out his
work.
2. What is the name of Tycho’s sister?
3. What model of the universe did Brahe support?
4. According to Kepler’s third law, the period of revolution of a planet is
related to the planet’s
5. Kepler determined the planetary orbits are elliptical. True? Or False?
6. At what age did Kepler became the assistant of a wealthy astronomer?
7-9. State the three law’s of motion by Sir Isaac Newton. (must be in order.
10. What is the connection of Johannes Kepler to Tycho Brahe?
 Set B

1-5 draw and label the Tychonian model

6-10 HOW CAN YOU RELATE THE THEORIES OF KEPLER TO NEWTON’S LAW OF MOTION
11- 15 Brahe’s aim was to confirm what?
16-20 what is the comparison between the theory of Brahe and Kepler about the model of
the universe