Law of universal gravitation

The law of universal gravitation was proposed by Isaac Newton in his famous book Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica, published along with his three laws of dynamics, in 1687. In this work Newton grounded what we now call classical mechanics.

Isaac Newton regarded gravity as a force. Today, with Albert Einstein's theory of relativity, we understand that gravity is not a force itself but a curvature in the fabric of spacetime.

However, for his time, the discovery of the English physicist was revolutionary and together with the laws of Kepler brought a broad vision of the functioning of the universe.

The mathematical formulation of universal gravitation is given according to the image below (vector form and force magnitude, respectively), where G is the approximate universal gravitational constant

G≅6.67 × 〖10〗 ^ (- 11) Nm ^ 2 / 〖Kg〗 ^ 2

A curious fact is that, contrary to what many think, the constant mentioned was not quantified by Newton (despite the scientist knowing of its existence), but by Henry Cavendish.