Edit page | Page history | Printable version

radius vector

1. (Science: mathematics) A straight line (or the length of such line) connecting any point, as of a curve, with a fixed point, or pole, round which the straight line turns, and to which it serves to refer the successive points of a curve, in a system of polar coordinates. See Coordinate.

2. (Science: astronomy) An ideal straight line joining the center of an attracting body with that of a body describing an orbit around it, as a line joining the sun and a planet or comet, or a planet and its satellite.