1. Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell'Innovazione, Università di Lecce and INFN Sezione di Lecce, Via Monteroni, 73100 Lecce, Italy
2. Joint Center for Earth Systems Technology (JCET/UMBC), University of Maryland, Baltimore County, 1000 Hilltop Circle, Baltimore, Maryland 21250, USA

Correspondence to: I. Ciufolini¹ Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to I.C. (Email: ignazio.ciufolini@unile.it).

Abstract

An important early prediction of Einstein's general relativity^{1, 2, 3} was the advance of the perihelion of Mercury's orbit, whose measurement provided one of the classical tests of Einstein's theory⁴. The advance of the orbital point-of-closest-approach also applies to a binary pulsar system^{5, 6} and to an Earth-orbiting satellite³. General relativity also predicts that the rotation of a body like Earth will drag the local inertial frames of reference around it^{3, 7}, which will affect the orbit of a satellite⁸. This Lense–Thirring effect has hitherto not been detected with high accuracy⁹, but its detection with an error of about 1 per cent is the main goal of Gravity Probe B—an ongoing space mission using orbiting gyroscopes¹⁰. Here we report a measurement of the Lense–Thirring effect on two Earth satellites: it is 99 5 per cent of the value predicted by general relativity; the uncertainty of this measurement includes all known random and systematic errors, but we allow for a total 10 per cent uncertainty to include underestimated and unknown sources of error.

1. Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell'Innovazione, Università di Lecce and INFN Sezione di Lecce, Via Monteroni, 73100 Lecce, Italy
2. Joint Center for Earth Systems Technology (JCET/UMBC), University of Maryland, Baltimore County, 1000 Hilltop Circle, Baltimore, Maryland 21250, USA

Correspondence to: I. Ciufolini¹ Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to I.C. (Email: ignazio.ciufolini@unile.it).

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