LAGEOS II perigee shift and Schwarzschild gravitoelectric field

• DOI: 10.1016/j.physleta.2003.07.015
• Publication Date: 2003-09-12T01:16:13Z
• Authors: David M. Lucchesi
• Keywords: Yukawa potential

The general relativity shift of LAGEOS II perigee due to Schwarzschild gravitoelectric field has been analyzed. From our results, using the actual gravity field solution EGM-96, we are potentially able to estimate LAGEOS II general relativistic shift with a 2% accuracy, over an observational period of about 7 years. The larger errors are due to the uncertainties in the even zonal harmonics of the Earth gravity field and to the non-gravitational perturbations mismodelling. This result can be viewed as a 2% accuracy in the determination of the combination � = (2 + 2γ − β)/3 of the parametrized-post-Newtonian (PPN) parameters γ and β. The result obtained may be used to test general relativity against other theories of gravity. In particular the result may be used to constrain a Yukawa-like interaction with a range of about 1-Earth radii.