Pericenter Distance

The Pericenter Distance of an object's orbit is the distance from its Orbital Parent to the pericenter, or closest point, of the orbit. The Pericenter Distance of an object with a circular orbit is equal to its Semi-Major Axis.

The pericenter of an object orbiting the Sun is sometimes referred to as the perihelion, while the pericenter of an object orbiting the Earth is sometimes called the perigee. Pericenter is also synonymous with periapse, although this term usually refers to the pericenter distance rather than the pericenter point.

Location
The Pericenter Distance property is located near the top of the Orbital Elements section of the Motion tab in an object's properties panel, if the object has an Orbital Parent. It is a lockable property with Semi-Major Axis, Apocenter Distance, and Eccentricity.

Units
Pericenter Distance can be viewed and edited using the following units:


 * Milky Way Galaxy radius (milky way) = 5.5×104 light year
 * Parsec (parsec) = 3.08568025×1016 m
 * Light-year (light year) = 9.46073047×1015 m
 * Astronomical Unit (AU) = 1.495978707×1011 m
 * Solar radius (sun) = 6.955×108 m
 * Lunar distance (lunar dist) = 3.844×108 m
 * Light-second (light sec) = 2.99792458×108 m
 * Jupiter radius (jupiter) = 6.9911×107 m
 * Earth radius (earth) = 6.37101×106 m
 * Moon radius (moon) = 1.7371×106 m
 * Kilometer (km) = 1000 m
 * Meter (m) is the SI base unit for length
 * Centimeter (cm) = 0.01 m
 * Millimeter (mm) = 0.001 m