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The parabola opens upward. It is shown elsewhere in this article that the equation of the parabola is 4fy = x 2, where f is the focal length. At the positive x end of the chord, x = c / 2 and y = d. Since this point is on the parabola, these coordinates must satisfy the equation above.
The quadratic formula is exactly correct when performed using the idealized arithmetic of real numbers, but when approximate arithmetic is used instead, for example pen-and-paper arithmetic carried out to a fixed number of decimal places or the floating-point binary arithmetic available on computers, the limitations of the number representation ...
Figure 1. Plots of quadratic function y = ax 2 + bx + c, varying each coefficient separately while the other coefficients are fixed (at values a = 1, b = 0, c = 0). A quadratic equation whose coefficients are real numbers can have either zero, one, or two distinct real-valued solutions, also called roots.
If a quadratic function is equated with zero, then the result is a quadratic equation. The solutions of a quadratic equation are the zeros (or roots) of the corresponding quadratic function, of which there can be two, one, or zero. The solutions are described by the quadratic formula. A quadratic polynomial or quadratic function can involve ...
A family of conic sections of varying eccentricity share a focus point and directrix line, including an ellipse (red, e = 1/2), a parabola (green, e = 1), and a hyperbola (blue, e = 2). The conic of eccentricity 0 in this figure is an infinitesimal circle centered at the focus, and the conic of eccentricity ∞ is an infinitesimally separated ...
In mathematics, a fixed point (sometimes shortened to fixpoint), also known as an invariant point, is a value that does not change under a given transformation. Specifically, for functions, a fixed point is an element that is mapped to itself by the function. Any set of fixed points of a transformation is also an invariant set.
From the point of view of projective geometry, an elliptic paraboloid is an ellipsoid that is tangent to the plane at infinity. Plane sections. The plane sections of an elliptic paraboloid can be: a parabola, if the plane is parallel to the axis, a point, if the plane is a tangent plane. an ellipse or empty, otherwise.
While a parabolic arch may resemble a catenary arch, a parabola is a quadratic function while a catenary is the hyperbolic cosine, cosh(x), a sum of two exponential functions. One parabola is f(x) = x 2 + 3x − 1, and hyperbolic cosine is cosh(x) = e x + e −x / 2 . The curves are unrelated.