New test of general relativity: Measurement of de Sitter geodetic precession rate for lunar perigee
- 16 March 1987
- journal article
- research article
- Published by American Physical Society (APS) in Physical Review Letters
- Vol. 58 (11) , 1062-1065
- https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.58.1062
Abstract
According to general relativity, the calculated rate of motion of lunar perigee should include a contribution of 19.2 msec/yr from geodetic precession. We show that existing analyses of lunar–laser-ranging data confirm the general-relativistic rate for geodetic precession with respect to the planetary dynamical frame. In addition, the comparison of Earth-rotation results from lunar laser ranging and from very-long-baseline interferometry (VLBI) shows that the relative drift of the planetary dynamical frame and the extragalactic VLBI reference frame is small. The estimated accuracy is about 10%.Keywords
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