he same initial conditions as in the N?1 integration. We consider that this test integration provides us with a ‘pseudo-true’ solution of planetary orbital evolution. Next, we compare the test integration with the main integration, N?1. For the period of 3 × 105 yr, we see a difference in mean anomalies of the Earth between the two integrations of ~0.52°(in the case of the N?1 integration). This difference can be extrapolated to the value ~8700°, about 25 rotations of Earth after 5 Gyr, since the error of longitudes increases linearly with time in the symplectic map. Similarly, the longitude error of Pluto can be estimated as ~12°. This value for Pluto is much better than the result in Kinoshita & Nakai (1996) where the difference is estimated as ~60°.
3 Numerical results – I. Glance at the raw data
In this section we briefly review the long-term stability of planetary orbital motion through some snapshots of raw numerical data. The orbital motion of planets indicates long-term stability in all of our numerical integrations: no orbital crossings nor close encounters between any pair of planets took place.
3.1 General description of the stability of planetary orbits
First, we briefly look at the general character of the long-term stability of planetary orbits. Our interest here focuses particularly on the inner four terrestrial planets for which the orbital time-scales are much shorter than those of the outer five planets. As we can see clearly from the planar orbital configurations shown in Figs 2 and 3, orbital positions of the terrestrial planets differ little between the initial and final part of each numerical integration, which spans several Gyr. The solid lines denoting the present orbits of the planets lie almost within the swarm of dots even in the final part of integrations (b) and (d). This indicates that throughout the entire integration period the almost regular variations of planetary orbital motion remain nearly the same as they are at present.
Vertical view of the four inner planetary orbits (from the z -axis direction) at the initial and final parts of the integrationsN±1. The axes units are au. The xy -plane is
(本章未完,请点击下一页继续阅读)