Bode’s, << BOH duhz, >> law is a scheme for representing the approximate distances of planets from the sun. The concept was devised and first published in 1766 by Johann D. Titius, a German mathematician and physicist, based on the six planets known at the time: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. The German astronomer Johann E. Bode popularized the law in a book published in 1772, and it became associated with his name.
Bode’s law operates according to a simple formula. Take the numbers 0, 3, 6, 12, 24, 48, 96, 192, 384, and 768. Each figure in the series, after 3, is obtained by doubling the preceding figure. Add 4 to every number and then divide each sum by 10. In the table with this article, the mean distances of various objects from the sun are compared with the distances of planets predicted by Bode’s law. The distances are given in astronomical units. An astronomical unit is equal to about 93 million miles (150 million kilometers), the mean distance of the earth from the sun.
The distances calculated by Bode’s law approximate the actual distances for Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus. Many large, rocky bodies in the Main Belt of asteroids almost match the distance of 2.8 astronomical units. Astronomers are uncertain about the significance of Bode’s law in the study of planetary orbits.
