Hohmann transfer orbit

In orbital mechanics, the Hohmann transfer orbit /ˈhoʊ.mʌn/ is an elliptical orbit used to transfer between two circular orbits of different radii in the same plane.

The orbital maneuver to perform the Hohmann transfer uses two engine impulses, one to move a spacecraft onto the transfer orbit and a second to move off it. This maneuver was named after Walter Hohmann, the German scientist who published a description of it in his 1925 book Die Erreichbarkeit der Himmelskörper ("The Accessibility of Celestial Bodies") Hohmann was influenced in part by the German science fiction author Kurd Lasswitz and his 1897 book Two Planets.

The diagram shows a Hohmann transfer orbit to bring a spacecraft from a lower circular orbit into a higher one. It is one half of an elliptic orbit that touches both the lower circular orbit the spacecraft wishes to leave (green and labeled 1 on diagram) and the higher circular orbit that it wishes to reach (red and labeled 3 on diagram). The transfer (yellow and labeled 2 on diagram) is initiated by firing the spacecraft's engine in order to accelerate it so that it will follow the elliptical orbit; this adds energy to the spacecraft's orbit. When the spacecraft has reached its destination orbit, its orbital speed (and hence its orbital energy) must be increased again in order to change the elliptic orbit to the larger circular one.

Due to the reversibility of orbits, Hohmann transfer orbits also work to bring a spacecraft from a higher orbit into a lower one; in this case, the spacecraft's engine is fired in the opposite direction to its current path, slowing the spacecraft and causing it to drop into the lower-energy elliptical transfer orbit. The engine is then fired again at the lower distance to slow the spacecraft into the lower circular orbit.

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