Axisymmetric geostrophic mode Created 2026-10-07 Updated 2026-10-14
A stationary mass density disturbance can be balanced by a changed azimuthal velocity in a shearing sheet. The continuity and azimuthal equations give zero radial velocity, while the radial equation balances Coriolis force against pressure and gravity. This mode is separate from the density-wave pair in the softened Toomre dispersion relation and is lost if one divides every equation by frequency.
Hubble's law 2026-10-14
Hubble's law states that the instantaneous rate of change of proper distance in cosmology between comoving observers is proportional to that distance:This is exact for fixed comoving distance in an FLRW metric: differentiating gives . The dot uses cosmic time, and both distances are compared on spatial slices at the same cosmic time. The rate is not a relative velocity measured in a single inertial frame of special relativity. Thus the instantaneous relation is not an exact observed redshift-distance formula. The associated Hubble flow describes the ideal expansion; peculiar velocities describe departures from it.
For nearby sources, the observed redshift approximately satisfieswhen source and observer peculiar velocities are small compared with , additional gravitational redshift is negligible, and the changes in the scale factor and Hubble parameter during light travel are small. Here can be taken as the present proper distance in cosmology; familiar distance conventions agree at leading order in small redshift. Briefly, , while , so cosmological redshift gives . At greater redshift, use an expansion history and an explicit distance convention instead.
Stipulate the illustrative Hubble constant and speed of light . A is a million parsecs. The following are computed examples, not a catalogue of observed galaxies:
- At , and the approximate cosmological redshift is .
- At , and the approximate cosmological redshift is .
- At , and the approximate cosmological redshift is .
The displayed values are exact arithmetic under the stipulated Hubble constant; the cosmological redshift estimates use the nearby approximation and become less accurate as distance grows.
Hubble's law turns a nearby observed redshift into an approximate distance indicator and makes the uniformity of cosmic expansion tangible: twice the proper distance in cosmology means twice the instantaneous separation rate. Recentring the ideal Hubble flow on another comoving observer preserves the same proportionality, as illustrated under scale factor, so recession in every direction does not select a central observer.
In his 1929 PNAS paper, Edwin Hubble presented a relation between the distances and radial velocities of extragalactic objects. His fits gave coefficients of and for 24 individual objects and nine groups respectively, and he used about as a rounded representative value. Those historical fits used the paper's distance estimates; they are distinct from the stipulated modern-scale illustration above. [ref]
https://www.astro.puc.cl/~rparra/tools/PAPERS/hubble_1929.pdf. Hubble (1929), original PNAS paper, pp. 170-171
. Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2024 iii Paper 314 2 a Solution 2026-09-25
Let denote the inward radial velocity. Steady spherical symmetry and mass conservation giveThe radial Euler momentum equation for the globally isothermal equation of state isThe logarithmic derivative of mass conservation is . Substitution gives the Isothermal Bondi equationAt a smooth sonic point, makes the coefficient of vanish, so the right-hand side must vanish too. ThereforeThe solution that crosses this critical point of the isothermal Bondi equation continuously is the transonic accretion solution.
