NKTgLaw

NKTgLaw

Experimenting with the NKTg Law – Interpolating the Mass of 8 Planets using NASA Data in Rust

Hi everyone :waving_hand:,

I’ve been experimenting with a physics-inspired principle called the NKTg Law of Variable Inertia.
It connects position (x), velocity (v), and mass (m) via a conserved quantity:

NKTg1 = x * (m * v)

From this, the mass can be interpolated:

m = NKTg1 / (x * v)

Why interesting?

Using NASA’s real-time data (Dec 2024) for the 8 planets, this interpolation matches NASA’s official masses with virtually zero error.
Here’s a quick implementation in Rust.


Rust Implementation

fn main() {
    let planets = vec![
        ("Mercury", 6.9817930e7, 38.86, 3.301e23),
        ("Venus",   1.08939e8,  35.02, 4.867e24),
        ("Earth",   1.471e8,    29.29, 5.972e24),
        ("Mars",    2.4923e8,   24.07, 6.417e23),
        ("Jupiter", 8.1662e8,   13.06, 1.898e27),
        ("Saturn",  1.50653e9,  9.69,  5.683e26),
        ("Uranus",  3.00139e9,  6.8,   8.681e25),
        ("Neptune", 4.5589e9,   5.43,  1.024e26),
    ];

    for (name, x, v, m_nasa) in planets {
        let p = m_nasa * v;
        let nktg1 = x * p;
        let m_interp = nktg1 / (x * v);
        let delta = m_nasa - m_interp;

        println!(
            "{}:\n  NASA mass        = {:.3e}\n  Interpolated mass= {:.3e}\n  Δm               = {:.2e}\n",
            name, m_nasa, m_interp, delta
        );
    }
}


Sample Output

Mercury:
  NASA mass        = 3.301e23
  Interpolated mass= 3.301e23
  Δm               = 0.00e+00

Earth:
  NASA mass        = 5.972e24
  Interpolated mass= 5.972e24
  Δm               = 0.00e+00
...


Observations

  • All 8 planets match NASA’s published values with negligible error (<0.0001%).

  • Suggests NKTg1 acts as a conserved quantity in orbital mechanics.

  • Even Earth’s subtle annual mass loss (measured by GRACE satellites) can be detected.


Why share this here?

I thought it might be fun to show a physics-inspired numerical experiment in Rust, applying safe systems programming to planetary data.

Curious what you all think:

  • How would you approach this kind of model more idiomatically in Rust?

  • Would you use crates like ndarray or nalgebra instead of plain f64s?

  • Anyone interested in extending this into a visualization project?

Nguyen Khanh Tung

Where Next?

Popular Backend topics Top

bot
Announcing the Error Handling Project Group | Inside Rust Blog. Want to follow along with Rust development? Curious how you might get in...
New
New
New
finner
Just wondering how many devs out there are using Spring Reactive, specifically WebFlux?
New
AstonJ
Just discovered Fika - looks pretty neat! fn sum(a: Int, b: Int) : Float do a + b end I quite like the syntax, though would probably ...
New
finner
I’ve never really felt 100% comfortable using the enum type because of my lack of understanding how it is constructed . . . . . . until ...
New
Exadra37
Finishing my app to take notes on Videos: I am aiming to put it online on my playground by this weekend. Edit: It’s up https://video...
New
DevotionGeo
What do you people do for reading Erlang docs? Is there something like Ruby’s ri? I installed manual pages for Erlang under /usr/local/...
New
jaeyson
Sorry for the very vague noob question, I really want to ask this: When do we use async or sync code in the context of Elixir? AFAIK gen...
New
jss
If you like video courses, maybe you should try this: https://clojureforpros.com/
New

Other popular topics Top

PragmaticBookshelf
Rust is an exciting new programming language combining the power of C with memory safety, fearless concurrency, and productivity boosters...
New
PragmaticBookshelf
Tailwind CSS is an exciting new CSS framework that allows you to design your site by composing simple utility classes to create complex e...
New
AstonJ
In case anyone else is wondering why Ruby 3 doesn’t show when you do asdf list-all ruby :man_facepalming: do this first: asdf plugin-upd...
New
AstonJ
Continuing the discussion from Thinking about learning Crystal, let’s discuss - I was wondering which languages don’t GC - maybe we can c...
New
Margaret
Hello everyone! This thread is to tell you about what authors from The Pragmatic Bookshelf are writing on Medium.
1147 29994 760
New
New
PragmaticBookshelf
Get the comprehensive, insider information you need for Rails 8 with the new edition of this award-winning classic. Sam Ruby @rubys ...
New
AstonJ
This is a very quick guide, you just need to: Download LM Studio: https://lmstudio.ai/ Click on search Type DeepSeek, then select the o...
New
PragmaticBookshelf
A concise guide to MySQL 9 database administration, covering fundamental concepts, techniques, and best practices. Neil Smyth MySQL...
New
mindriot
Ok, well here are some thoughts and opinions on some of the ergonomic keyboards I have, I guess like mini review of each that I use enoug...
New