Restricted \(N+1\)-body problem: existence and stability of relative equilibria (Q1766808)

The authors consider the plane restricted \((N+1)\) body Newtonian problem (\(N\) bodies of equal mass \(m\) are placed at the vertices of a regular \(N\)-gon and rotate around the additional central mass \(m_0\)). The cases \(m_0=0\) and \(m_0>0\) are analyzed separately. The existence of relative equilibria for a particle with mass \(\mu\) (or with a negligible mass) is proved, and linear stability of these equilibria is investigated. It turns out that the linear stability never holds when the position of the zero-mass particle is on a semi-axis joining the central mass with the primary. For positions on semi-axes emanating from the first one with an angle \(\frac{\pi}{n}\), the linear stability holds when the ratio of masses \(\frac{m_0}{M}\) \((M=mn)\) is sufficiently large.