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An ellipse (red) obtained as the intersection of a cone with an inclined plane. Ellipse: notations Ellipses: examples with increasing eccentricity. In mathematics, an ellipse is a plane curve surrounding two focal points, such that for all points on the curve, the sum of the two distances to the focal points is a constant.
Using these concepts, "two diameters are conjugate when each is the polar of the figurative point of the other." [5] Only one of the conjugate diameters of a hyperbola cuts the curve. The notion of point-pair separation distinguishes an ellipse from a hyperbola: In the ellipse every pair of conjugate diameters separates every other pair. In a ...
The director circle of an ellipse is a special case of this more general construction with two points P 1 and P 2 at the foci of the ellipse, weights w 1 = w 2 = 1, and C equal to the square of the major axis of the ellipse. The Apollonius circle, the locus of points X such that the ratio of distances of X to two foci P 1 and P 2 is a fixed ...
The three types of conic section are the hyperbola, the parabola, and the ellipse; the circle is a special case of the ellipse, though it was sometimes called as a fourth type. The ancient Greek mathematicians studied conic sections, culminating around 200 BC with Apollonius of Perga's systematic work on their properties.
A circle is a shape consisting of all points in a plane that are at a given distance from a given point, the centre. The distance between any point of the circle and the centre is called the radius. The length of a line segment connecting two points on the circle and passing through the centre is called the diameter.
A circle of radius a compressed to an ellipse. A sphere of radius a compressed to an oblate ellipsoid of revolution. Flattening is a measure of the compression of a circle or sphere along a diameter to form an ellipse or an ellipsoid of revolution respectively. Other terms used are ellipticity, or oblateness.
An ellipse can be defined as the locus of points for which the sum of the distances to two given foci is constant. A circle is the special case of an ellipse in which the two foci coincide with each other. Thus, a circle can be more simply defined as the locus of points each of which is a fixed distance from a single given focus.
The semi-minor axis of an ellipse runs from the center of the ellipse (a point halfway between and on the line running between the foci) to the edge of the ellipse. The semi-minor axis is half of the minor axis. The minor axis is the longest line segment perpendicular to the major axis that connects two points on the ellipse's edge.