Secular dynamics of hierarchical multiple systems composed of nested binaries, with an arbitrary number of bodies and arbitrary hierarchical structure. III. Suborbital effects: hybrid integration techniques and orbit-averaging corrections

Understand

The SecularMultiple code, presented in two previous papers of this series, integrates the long-term dynamical evolution of multiple systems with any number of bodies and hierarchical structure, provided that the system is composed of nested binaries.

• In the formalism underlying SecularMultiple, we previously averaged over all orbits in the system.
• This approximation significantly speeds up numerical integration of the equations of motion, making large population synthesis studies possible.
• However, the orbit averaging approximation can break down when the secular evolution timescale of the system is comparable to or shorter than any of the orbital periods in the system.