Classification of four-body central configurations with three equal masses

Abstract

It is known that a central configuration of the planar four body problem consisting of three particles of equal mass possesses a symmetry if the configuration is convex or is concave with the unequal mass in the interior. We use analytic methods to show that besides the family of equilateral triangle configurations, there are exactly one family of concave and one family of convex central configurations, which completely classifies such central configurations. (C)2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved

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