NUTATION

in astronomy, a slight wobbling motion of the earth's axis. The causes of nutation are similar to those of the precession of the equinoxes, involving the varying attraction of the moon on the earth's equatorial bulge. However, the period of the motion is only 18.6 years, the same as that of the precession of the moon's nodes, as opposed to the nearly 26,000-year period of the precession of the equinoxes. Nutation was discovered by the English astronomer James Bradley in 1728 but was not explained until 20 years later.

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The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright© 2004, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Lernout & Hauspie Speech Products N.V. All rights reserved.

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Questia Books and Articles on: Nutation
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books on: Nutation  - 90 results

       More book Results: 1-10 11-20 21-30 31-40 41-50 >>  
 
1.
Environmental Change: The Evolving Ecosphere
Book by Richard John Huggett; Routledge, 1997
...as nutation. The effect of nutation is to produce waves on the...2 . The Earths principal nutation cycle entails a 9.18 increase...18.6-year cycle. Minor nutations, sometimes called librations...main ones are a 9.3-year nutation cycle, which is half the...
2.
A Dictionary of Astronomy
Book by Ian Ridpath; Oxford University Press, 1997
Subjects: Astronomy--Dictionaries
...particular epoch, with the effect of nutation subtracted. The mean equinox therefore...without short-term oscillations due to nutation. See also TRUE EQUINOX. mean motion...epoch, with the oscillations due to nutation removed. It moves smoothly across the...
3.
Climate: Present, Past and Future - Vol. 1
Book by H. H. Lamb; Methuen, 1972
Subjects: Climatology, Paleoclimatology, Weather Forecasting
...performs a free oscillation or nutation as predicted by EULER, in...circular cone. This free nutation, with a period of about 14...periods were compared. The nutations of the Earths pole produce...MAKSIMOV associates with the free nutation. The pressure wave concerned...
4.
An Introduction to Celestial Mechanics
Book by Theodore E. Sterne; Interscience Publishers, 1960
Subjects: Celestial Mechanics
...that cause the motions of the axis Oz known as nutation and luni-solar precession. These motions will...angles - and are called, respectively, the nutation in longitude and the nutation in obliquity; they are composed of periodic...
5.
A Short History of Science to the Nineteenth Century
Book by Charles Singer; The Clarendon Press, 1941
Subjects: Science--History
...conceptions, aberration of light 1729 and nutation of the earths axis 1748 . FIG. 69...first to observe and to explain. The nutation Latin nodding of the earths axis is an...earths axis. It has transpired that nutation is only one of a whole series of complications...
More book Results: 1-10 11-20 21-30 31-40 41-50 >>

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journal articles on: Nutation  - 5 results

 
 
1.
Pan-african Rejuvenation of the C. 1.1 Ga Natal Metamorphic Province (South Africa): K-ar Muscovite and Titanite Fission Track Evidence
Journal article by J. Jacobs, J. Thomas; Journal of the Geological Society, Vol. 153, 1996
Subjects: Geological time, Geology, South Africa, Temperature
...velocity (e.g. 22.2 h/day for the Pan-African at 530 Ma) and the free nutation of the fluid core resonated with the Earths retrograde annual forced nutation caused by solar torques. The resulting resonance would give rise to an increase...
2.
Who Would Be Affected by Soda Taxes?
Journal article by Leslie McGranahan, Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach; Chicago Fed Letter, 2011
Subjects: Beverages, Bills, Economic theory, Studies, United States, Use taxes
...provide data on the role SSBs play in individuals diets. The data here come from the 2007-08 wave of the National Health and Nutation Examination Survey (NHANES),7 and the sample is limited to adults aged 20 or older. Calorie consumption is collected using...
3.
New Alleles of Sir2 Define Cell-cycle-specific Silencing Functions
Journal article by Mirela Matecic, Kristen Martins-Taylor, Merrit Hickman, Jason Tanny; Genetics, Vol. 173, 2006
Subjects: Cell cycle, Data analysis, Histone Deacetylases, Ribosomal DNA, SIR2 protein, S cerevisiae, SIR4 protein, S cerevisiae, Silent Information Regulator Proteins, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Sirtuins, Strain
...were added to 10 ;Cl IgG sepharose beads (Pharmacia 17-0969-01) that had been washed with lysis buffer. After 2 hr of nutation at 4 , beads were collected by centrifugation at 2 krpm for 1 min at 4 and washed three times with wash buffer (50 mM HEPES...
4.
A Mock-Biblical Controversy: Sir Richard Blackmore in the 'Dunciad.'
Journal article by Thomas Jemielity; Philological Quarterly, Vol. 74, 1995
Subjects: Bible and literature--Anecdotes, cartoons, satire, etc., Pope, Alexander--Criticism, interpretation, etc., Satire--Criticism, interpretation, etc.
...Dunces. With very un-Job-like behavior, they fall inexorably under the weight of this ordeal: So from the mid-most the nutation spreads Round and more round, now Blackmores contribution oer all the sea of heads. 2. 409-10 In Blackmores Job the context...
5.
"To Wordsworth" and the "White Obi"'. Slavery, Determination, and Contingency in Shelley's Peter Bell the Third
Journal article by Eric Lindstrom; Studies in Romanticism, Vol. 47, 2008
Subjects: Poets--Criticism and interpretation, Poets--Works, Shelley, Percy Bysshe--Criticism and interpretation, Shelley, Percy Bysshe--Works
...destroyed are swept to things unborn Dunciad 1: 242; "Like motion from one circle to the rest; / So from the mid-most the nutation spreads" 2: 409). But the power of Popes final curtain lies in its element of unrelenting allegory, and in that fanciful...


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magazine articles on: Nutation  - 1 result

 
 
1.
The Complexity of Global Warming
Magazine article; World and I, Vol. 17, January 2002
...temperature and climate changes, from the effects due to other sources, such as solar radiation, precession of equinoxes, nutation of the north-south Earth axis, and so forth. The authors correctly point out that there are "discrepancies" among several...


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encyclopedia articles on: Nutation  - 3 results

 
 
1.
Nutation
Encyclopedia article; The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition, 2009
NUTATION in astronomy, a slight wobbling motion of the earths axis. The causes of nutation are similar to those of the precession of the...period of the precession of the equinoxes. Nutation was discovered by the English astronomer James...
2.
Precession of the Equinoxes
Encyclopedia article; The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition, 2009
...of the sun and moon are not always the same, there is some wobble in the motion of the earths axis; this wobble, called nutation , causes the celestial poles to move, not in perfect circles, but in a series of S-shaped curves with a period of 18...
3.
Bradley, James
Encyclopedia article; The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition, 2009
...instruments; with some of these he cataloged the positions of more than 3,000 stars. His second important discovery, the nutation, or "nodding," of the earths axis, was only made known in 1748, after it had stood the test of careful observations over...


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