Search Results for “parabola”
Parabola Property
The triangle containing the normal and tangent at a point on a parabola sits inside a semicircle centered at the parabola's focus.
Tangent Triangle
We show the areas of the triangle formed by joining 3 points on a parabola, and that formed by the tangents to the parabola at those points.
Tchirnhausen's Cubic
The caustic formed by light projecting perpendicular to the axis of a parabola is called Tchirnhausen's Cubic. What happens when the light projects at some other angle?
Projectile High Point
Press the play button to fire a projectile in the direction of the arrow. Move the arrow and try again. Notice the high points of the trajectory lie on an ellipse. If the initial velocity of the projectile is v, and gravity is g, what is the equation of the ellipse?
Parabolic Solar Cooker
Explore the relationship between f-number of a parabolic solar cooker and its sensitivity to change in angle of incoming light
Cubic Spline
Many computer drawing programs use cubic splines to represent arcs. Our diagram shows how a spline can be constructed from 4 control points. We highlight that it is a moving average of two parabolas. These parabolas are exactly the string art parabolas.
