Miscellanea from the history of celestial mechanics

Abstract

The KS-transformation introduced by P. Kustaanheimo and E. Stiefel into celestial mechanics is derived straight from the ‘Kepler Formulas’. There follow the treatment of the inverse Newton problem comprising the derivation of the differential equations of mechanics by J. Hermann and L. Euler and also remarks concerning the fundamental papers by Euler about the planet problem and then-body problem. The conclusion is a simple example given by A. Voss and H. Liebmann, for the differential equations of mechanics with non-holonomic condition, which is of ‘pseudoplanetary’ quality.