Virial radius from turnaround energy

ID: virial-radius-from-turnaround-energy

For a homologous, isolated collapsing sphere, write its Newtonian gravitational potential energy as . At spherical-collapse turnaround the coherent kinetic energy vanishes. Conserving total energy and applying the virial theorem to the final equilibrium gives and hence . If the gravitational structure coefficient changes, the ratio is instead. Mass loss, surface pressure, external tides and energy exchange also change this estimate.

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