A study of periodic orbits near Europa

Periodic orbits and their invariant manifolds are known to be useful for transportation in space, but a large portion of the related research goes toward a small number of periodic orbit families that are relatively simple to compute. In this study, motivated by a search for new and lesser-known families of useful periodic orbits, the bifurcation diagram near Europa is explored and 400 bifurcation points are found. Families are generated for 74 of these and provided in a publicly accessible database. Of these 74 generated families, those that also appear to exist in a model perturbed by certain zonal harmonics of Jupiter and Europa are identified. Differential corrections techniques are discussed, and a new method for natural parameter continuation in the three-body problem is presented. Periodic orbits with particularly useful geometric and stability properties for science purposes are highlighted.