This talk will celebrate the first anniversary of the discovery of the planet Neptune, in Neptunian years, of course! Neptune has an orbital period of 164.79 Earth years and was discovered by LeVerrier in 1846, i.e., 165 years ago! This is a great pretext to review some of the key steps in the history of celestial mechanics and marvel at the ingenuity of the great minds that made it happen.

Wayne State Physicist Claude A. Pruneau will present five great triumphs of celestial mechanics from Copernicus to the recent Cassini mission.