Both models have the Sun in the centre and all the planets going round it, including the Earth.
Copernicus (1543) used a system of circles and epicycles similar to the one used by Ptolemy over a thousand years earlier. Both models represented the movements of the planets among the stars with quite good accuracy.
Kepler (1609) used the novel idea of elliptical orbits for the planets. Tycho Brahe had made new observations with unprecedented accuracy, and Kepler found that the new elliptical model fitted these observations more accurately than the other models.
At the time the new model was published there was no way of deciding which model was right. But, 70-80 years later, Isaac Newton's theoretical discoveries in gravity and dynamics were used to show that the planets must follow elliptical orbits under the force of the Sun's gravity. After that Kepler's model was accepted generally.
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Isaac Newton
Johannes Kepler was a German astronomer known for his laws of planetary motion, which described how planets move in elliptical orbits around the sun. He also made significant contributions to the development of optics and mathematics.
Kepler's law that describes how fast planets travel at different points in their orbits is called the Law of Equal Areas. This law states that a planet will travel faster when it is closer to the Sun and slower when it is farther away, so that the area it sweeps out in a given time is the same regardless of its distance from the Sun.
Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion:1] Each planet moves in an elliptical orbit with the sun at one focus2] The line form the sun to any planet sweeps out equal areas of space in equal time intervals3] The squares of the times of revolution (days, months or years) of the planets are proportional to the cubes of their average distances from the sun.
Kepler was not satisfied with the circle as he found that it did not accurately fit all the observed locations of Mars. He later discovered that Mars's orbit was actually elliptical, not circular, leading to his formulation of the laws of planetary motion.