We’ve all been taught from our childhood that planets revolve around the sun. But, is that exactly true ?
Before we get into the topic, you need to know something about the largest planet in our solar system. Especially about its mass.
Jupiter has a mass around 1.898 × 10^27 kg (calculate it) Hence, it has about 2.4 times the gravity of Earth. Speaking of Earth, almost 1000 Earths could fit inside it. Yes, you read that right.
Let’s get back to the topic. Is Jupiter really revolving the sun?
Before I answer that, you need to know something. No planet ACTUALLY revolves the sun.
According to Newton’s Gravitational law, every object exerts gravitational force over other. It varied with the mass. So, just consider Earth. Earth also exerts some gravitational force over the sun, so does the Sun. So, a center is created and both earth and the sun revolves that center point (Hmmm…)
But, as mass of our Earth is negligible while comparing to our sun, the center exists very very very close to the core of the Sun. So, what actually moves, is our Earth.
But its now the same, in case of Jupiter. Though Jupiter is just 1% of the mass of the sun, it is so huge, so that the center point is actually outside the Sun, making it move(Whoa!)
This was released by NASA in order to demonstrate this.