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  2. Osculating circle - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osculating_circle

    An osculating circle is a circle that best approximates the curvature of a curve at a specific point. It is tangent to the curve at that point and has the same curvature as the curve at that point. [2] The osculating circle provides a way to understand the local behavior of a curve and is commonly used in differential geometry and calculus.

  3. Curvature - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curvature

    The normal curvature, k n, is the curvature of the curve projected onto the plane containing the curve's tangent T and the surface normal u; the geodesic curvature, k g, is the curvature of the curve projected onto the surface's tangent plane; and the geodesic torsion (or relative torsion), τ r, measures the rate of change of the surface ...

  4. Torsion of a curve - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torsion_of_a_curve

    A plane curve with non-vanishing curvature has zero torsion at all points. Conversely, if the torsion of a regular curve with non-vanishing curvature is identically zero, then this curve belongs to a fixed plane. The curvature and the torsion of a helix are constant. Conversely, any space curve whose curvature and torsion are both constant and ...

  5. Frenet–Serret formulas - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frenet–Serret_formulas

    A space curve; the vectors T, N, B; and the osculating plane spanned by T and N. In differential geometry, the Frenet–Serret formulas describe the kinematic properties of a particle moving along a differentiable curve in three-dimensional Euclidean space, or the geometric properties of the curve itself irrespective of any motion.

  6. Radius of curvature - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radius_of_curvature

    Radius of curvature and center of curvature. In differential geometry, the radius of curvature, R, is the reciprocal of the curvature. For a curve, it equals the radius of the circular arc which best approximates the curve at that point. For surfaces, the radius of curvature is the radius of a circle that best fits a normal section or ...

  7. Sagitta (geometry) - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagitta_(geometry)

    In the following equations, denotes the sagitta (the depth or height of the arc), equals the radius of the circle, and the length of the chord spanning the base of the arc. As 1 2 l {\displaystyle {\tfrac {1}{2}}l} and r − s {\displaystyle r-s} are two sides of a right triangle with r {\displaystyle r} as the hypotenuse , the Pythagorean ...

  8. Osculating curve - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osculating_curve

    Examples of osculating curves of different orders include: The tangent line to a curve C at a point p, the osculating curve from the family of straight lines. The tangent line shares its first derivative with C and therefore has first-order contact with C. [1] [2] [4] The osculating circle to C at p, the osculating curve from the family of circles.

  9. Descartes' theorem - Wikipedia

    en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Descartes'_theorem

    When four tangent circles described by equation (2) all have integer curvatures, the alternative fourth circle described by the second solution to the equation must also have an integer curvature. This is because both solutions differ from an integer by the square root of an integer, and so either solution can only be an integer if this square ...