abstract:The geodetic effect (also known as geodetic precession, de Sitter precession or de Sitter effect) represents the effect of the curvature of spacetime, predicted by general relativity, on a vector carried along with an orbiting body. For example, the vector could be the angular momentum of a gyroscope orbiting the Earth, as carried out by the Gravity Probe B experiment.
This phenomenon is a spiral distortion of space which should if relativity is correct happen when massive bodies rotate. (In essence, such bodies drag space round with them.) Frame-dragging is predicted to cause an additional precession of one hundred-thousandth of a degree, perpendicular to that caused by the geodeticeffect.