The Cambridge N-body lectures

Sverre J. Aarseth (auth.), Sverre J. Aarseth, Christopher A. Tout, Rosemary A. Mardling (eds.)9781402084300, 1402084307

Published under the auspices of the Royal Astronomical Society, this volume contains a set of extensive school tested lectures, with the aim to give a coherent and thorough background knowledge of the subject and to introduce the latest developments in N-body computational astrophysics.

The topics cover a wide range from the classical few-body problem with discussions of resonance, chaos and stability to realistic modelling of star clusters as well as descriptions of codes, algorithms and special hardware for N-body simulations.

This collection of topics, related to the gravitational N-body problem, will prove useful to both students and researchers in years to come.

Table of contents :
Front Matter….Pages I-X
Direct N -Body Codes….Pages 1-30
Regular Algorithms for the Few-Body Problem….Pages 31-58
Resonance, Chaos and Stability: The Three-Body Problem in Astrophysics….Pages 59-96
Fokker–planck Treatment of Collisional Stellar Dynamics….Pages 97-121
Monte-Carlo Models of Collisional Stellar Systems….Pages 123-158
Particle-Mesh Technique and Superbox….Pages 159-169
Dynamical Friction….Pages 171-179
Initial Conditions for Star Clusters….Pages 181-259
Stellar Evolution….Pages 261-282
N -Body Stellar Evolution….Pages 283-296
Binary Stars….Pages 297-319
N – Body Binary Evolution….Pages 321-332
The Workings of a Stellar Evolution Code….Pages 333-345
Realistic N – Body Simulations of Globular Clusters….Pages 347-376
Parallelization, Special Hardware and Post-Newtonian Dynamics in Direct N – Body Simulations….Pages 377-389
Educational N – Body Websites….Pages 391-397
Back Matter….Pages 399-402