Instability of the Gravitational N-Body Problem in the Large-N Limit

We use a systolic N-body algorithm to evaluate the linear stability of the gravitational N-body problem for N up to 1.3 x 10^5, two orders of magnitude greater than in previous experiments. For the first time, a clear ~ln N-dependence of the perturbation growth rate is seen. The e-folding time for N = 10^5 is roughly 1/20 of a crossing time.