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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 April 2016
Many of the important applications of the circular planar restricted problem of three bodies involve motion in the vicinity of the unit circle, (as defined in canonical units). It is then of interest to develop simplified models which are valid in this region. These models preserve the gross characteristics of the original system but they possess simpler equations of motion.
We will also show that several simplified models can be seen as a perturbation of a very well known simple linear system: the Clohessy-Wiltshire equations used by NASA in all their rendezvous operations. These are actually very close to the well-known Hill problem. We will thus consider the Restricted problem as a perturbed Hill or Clohessy-Wiltshire problem. We also introduce the Clohessy-Wiltshire Lagrangian in polar coordinates.