Roche limit

(redirected from Roche radius)
Also found in: Encyclopedia.

Related to Roche radius: Roche limit, tidal radius

Roche limit

(rōsh)

The smallest distance at which a natural satellite can orbit a celestial body without being torn apart by the larger body's gravitational force. The distance depends on the densities of the two bodies and the orbit of the satellite.

[After Edouard Albert Roche (1820-1883), French mathematician.]

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Roche limit

(rɒʃ)

(Astronomy) astronomy the distance from the centre of a body, such as a planet, at which the tidal forces are stronger than the mutual gravitational attraction between two adjacent orbiting objects

[C19: named after E. A. Roche (1820–83), French mathematician]

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

Translations

limite di Roche

References in periodicals archive ?

This is due to the fact that the rings spread over time and, when they reach a certain distance from the planet (known as the Roche limit or Roche radius), their ends agglomerate and form small bodies that break off and move away.