Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The basic triangle on a unit sphere. Both vertices and angles at the vertices of a triangle are denoted by the same upper case letters A, B, and C. Sides are denoted by lower-case letters: a, b, and c. The sphere has a radius of 1, and so the side lengths and lower case angles are equivalent (see arc length).
The lengths of the sides a, b, c of a spherical triangle are their central angles, measured in angular units rather than linear units. (On a unit sphere, the angle (in radians) and length around the sphere are numerically the same. On other spheres, the angle (in radians) is equal to the length around the sphere divided by the radius.)
The sum of the angles of a spherical triangle is not equal to 180°. A sphere is a curved surface, but locally the laws of the flat (planar) Euclidean geometry are good approximations. In a small triangle on the face of the earth, the sum of the angles is only slightly more than 180 degrees. A sphere with a spherical triangle on it.
Given a unit sphere, a "spherical triangle" on the surface of the sphere is defined by the great circles connecting three points u, v, and w on the sphere (shown at right). If the lengths of these three sides are a (from u to v), b (from u to w), and c (from v to w), and the angle of the corner opposite c is C, then the (first) spherical law of ...
For example, one sphere that is described in Cartesian coordinates with the equation x 2 + y 2 + z 2 = c 2 can be described in spherical coordinates by the simple equation r = c. (In this system—shown here in the mathematics convention—the sphere is adapted as a unit sphere, where the radius is set to unity and then can generally be ignored ...
Regular polygons; Description Figure Second moment of area Comment A filled regular (equiliteral) triangle with a side length of a = = [6] The result is valid for both a horizontal and a vertical axis through the centroid, and therefore is also valid for an axis with arbitrary direction that passes through the origin.
If the five diagonals are rational (the case called a Brahmagupta pentagon by Sastry (2005)), then the radius of its circumscribed circle must also be rational, and the pentagon may be partitioned into three Heronian triangles by cutting it along any two non-crossing diagonals, or into five Heronian triangles by cutting it along the five radii ...
This formula generalizes Heron's formula for the area of a triangle. A triangle may be regarded as a quadrilateral with one side of length zero. From this perspective, as d (or any one side) approaches zero, a cyclic quadrilateral converges into a cyclic triangle (all triangles are cyclic), and Brahmagupta's formula simplifies to Heron's formula.