Rhombicuboctahedron | |
---|---|
Type | Archimdean Uniform polyhedron |
Faces | 26 |
Edges | 48 |
Vertices | 24 |
Vertex configuration | |
Symmetry group | Octahedral symmetry |
Dual polyhedron | Deltoidal icositetrahedron |
Vertex figure | |
Net | |
In geometry, the rhombicuboctahedron, or small rhombicuboctahedron, is a polyhedron with eight triangular, six square, and twelve rectangular faces. There are 24 identical vertices, with one triangle, one square, and two rectangles meeting at each one. If all the rectangles are themselves square (equivalently, all the edges are the same length, ensuring the triangles are equilateral), it is an Archimedean solid. The polyhedron has octahedral symmetry, like the cube and octahedron. Its dual is called the deltoidal icositetrahedron or trapezoidal icositetrahedron, although its faces are not really true trapezoids.
Johannes Kepler in his 1618 Harmonices Mundi named this polyhedron a rhombicuboctahedron, being short for truncated cuboctahedral rhombus, with cuboctahedral rhombus being his name for a rhombic dodecahedron. [1] There are different truncations of a rhombic dodecahedron into a topological rhombicuboctahedron: Prominently its rectification (left), the one that creates the uniform solid (center), and the rectification of the dual cuboctahedron (right), which is the core of the dual compound.
It can also be called an expanded or cantellated cube or octahedron, from truncation operations on either uniform polyhedron.
There are distortions of the rhombicuboctahedron that, while some of the faces are not regular polygons, are still vertex-uniform. Some of these can be made by taking a cube or octahedron and cutting off the edges, then trimming the corners, so the resulting polyhedron has six square and twelve rectangular faces. These have octahedral symmetry and form a continuous series between the cube and the octahedron, analogous to the distortions of the rhombicosidodecahedron or the tetrahedral distortions of the cuboctahedron. However, the rhombicuboctahedron also has a second set of distortions with six rectangular and sixteen trapezoidal faces, which do not have octahedral symmetry but rather Th symmetry, so they are invariant under the same rotations as the tetrahedron but different reflections.
The lines along which a Rubik's Cube can be turned are, projected onto a sphere, similar, topologically identical, to a rhombicuboctahedron's edges. In fact, variants using the Rubik's Cube mechanism have been produced which closely resemble the rhombicuboctahedron. [2] [3]
The rhombicuboctahedron is used in three uniform space-filling tessellations: the cantellated cubic honeycomb, the runcitruncated cubic honeycomb, and the runcinated alternated cubic honeycomb.
The rhombicuboctahedron can be dissected into two square cupolae and a central octagonal prism. A rotation of one cupola by 45 degrees creates the pseudorhombicuboctahedron. Both of these polyhedra have the same vertex figure: 3.4.4.4.
There are three pairs of parallel planes that each intersect the rhombicuboctahedron in a regular octagon. The rhombicuboctahedron may be divided along any of these to obtain an octagonal prism with regular faces and two additional polyhedra called square cupolae, which count among the Johnson solids; it is thus an elongated square orthobicupola . These pieces can be reassembled to give a new solid called the elongated square gyrobicupola or pseudorhombicuboctahedron, with the symmetry of a square antiprism. In this the vertices are all locally the same as those of a rhombicuboctahedron, with one triangle and three squares meeting at each one, but are not all identical with respect to the entire polyhedron, since some are closer to the symmetry axis than others.
Rhombicuboctahedron | |
Pseudorhombicuboctahedron |
The rhombicuboctahedron has six special orthogonal projections, centered, on a vertex, on two types of edges, and three types of faces: triangles, and two squares. The last two correspond to the B2 and A2 Coxeter planes.
Centered by | Vertex | Edge 3-4 | Edge 4-4 | Face Square-1 | Face Square-2 | Face Triangle |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Solid | ||||||
Wireframe | ||||||
Projective symmetry | [2] | [2] | [2] | [2] | [4] | [6] |
Dual |
The rhombicuboctahedron can also be represented as a spherical tiling, and projected onto the plane via a stereographic projection. This projection is conformal, preserving angles but not areas or lengths. Straight lines on the sphere are projected as circular arcs on the plane.
(6) square-centered | (6) square-centered | (8) triangle-centered | |
Orthogonal projection | Stereographic projections |
---|
A half symmetry form of the rhombicuboctahedron, , exists with pyritohedral symmetry, [4,3+], (3*2) as Coxeter diagram , Schläfli symbol s2{3,4}, and can be called a cantic snub octahedron. This form can be visualized by alternatingly coloring the edges of the 6 squares. These squares can then be distorted into rectangles, while the 8 triangles remain equilateral. The 12 diagonal square faces will become isosceles trapezoids. In the limit, the rectangles can be reduced to edges, and the trapezoids become triangles, and an icosahedron is formed, by a snub octahedron construction, , s{3,4}. (The compound of two icosahedra is constructed from both alternated positions.)
Pyritohedral symmetry variations | |||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Uniform geometry | Nonuniform geometry | Nonuniform geometry | In the limit, an icosahedron snub octahedron, , from one of two positions. | Compound of two icosahedra from both alternated positions. |
Cartesian coordinates for the vertices of a rhombicuboctahedron centred at the origin, with edge length 2 units, are all the even permutations of
If the original rhombicuboctahedron has unit edge length, its dual strombic icositetrahedron has edge lengths
The area A and the volume V of the rhombicuboctahedron of edge length a are:
The optimal packing fraction of rhombicuboctahedra is given by
It was noticed that this optimal value is obtained in a Bravais lattice by de Graaf ( 2011 ). Since the rhombicuboctahedron is contained in a rhombic dodecahedron whose inscribed sphere is identical to its own inscribed sphere, the value of the optimal packing fraction is a corollary of the Kepler conjecture: it can be achieved by putting a rhombicuboctahedron in each cell of the rhombic dodecahedral honeycomb, and it cannot be surpassed, since otherwise the optimal packing density of spheres could be surpassed by putting a sphere in each rhombicuboctahedron of the hypothetical packing which surpasses it.
The 1495 Portrait of Luca Pacioli , traditionally attributed to Jacopo de' Barbari, includes a glass rhombicuboctahedron half-filled with water, which may have been painted by Leonardo da Vinci. [5] The first printed version of the rhombicuboctahedron was by Leonardo and appeared in Pacioli's Divina proportione (1509).
A spherical 180° × 360° panorama can be projected onto any polyhedron; but the rhombicuboctahedron provides a good enough approximation of a sphere while being easy to build. This type of projection, called Philosphere, is possible from some panorama assembly software. It consists of two images that are printed separately and cut with scissors while leaving some flaps for assembly with glue. [6]
During the Rubik's Cube craze of the 1980s, at least two twisty puzzles sold had the form of a rhombicuboctahedron (the mechanism was similar to that of a Rubik's Cube). [2] [3] [ better source needed ]
The rhombicuboctahedron is one of a family of uniform polyhedra related to the cube and regular octahedron.
Uniform octahedral polyhedra | ||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Symmetry: [4,3], (*432) | [4,3]+ (432) | [1+,4,3] = [3,3] (*332) | [3+,4] (3*2) | |||||||
{4,3} | t{4,3} | r{4,3} r{31,1} | t{3,4} t{31,1} | {3,4} {31,1} | rr{4,3} s2{3,4} | tr{4,3} | sr{4,3} | h{4,3} {3,3} | h2{4,3} t{3,3} | s{3,4} s{31,1} |
= | = | = | = or | = or | = | |||||
| | | | | ||||||
Duals to uniform polyhedra | ||||||||||
V43 | V3.82 | V(3.4)2 | V4.62 | V34 | V3.43 | V4.6.8 | V34.4 | V33 | V3.62 | V35 |
This polyhedron is topologically related as a part of sequence of cantellated polyhedra with vertex figure (3.4.n.4), and continues as tilings of the hyperbolic plane. These vertex-transitive figures have (*n32) reflectional symmetry.
*n32 symmetry mutation of expanded tilings: 3.4.n.4 | ||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Symmetry *n32 [n,3] | Spherical | Euclid. | Compact hyperb. | Paracomp. | ||||
*232 [2,3] | *332 [3,3] | *432 [4,3] | *532 [5,3] | *632 [6,3] | *732 [7,3] | *832 [8,3]... | *∞32 [∞,3] | |
Figure | ||||||||
Config. | 3.4.2.4 | 3.4.3.4 | 3.4.4.4 | 3.4.5.4 | 3.4.6.4 | 3.4.7.4 | 3.4.8.4 | 3.4.∞.4 |
*n42 symmetry mutation of expanded tilings: n.4.4.4 | |||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Symmetry [n,4], (*n42) | Spherical | Euclidean | Compact hyperbolic | Paracomp. | |||||||
*342 [3,4] | *442 [4,4] | *542 [5,4] | *642 [6,4] | *742 [7,4] | *842 [8,4] | *∞42 [∞,4] | |||||
Expanded figures | |||||||||||
Config. | 3.4.4.4 | 4.4.4.4 | 5.4.4.4 | 6.4.4.4 | 7.4.4.4 | 8.4.4.4 | ∞.4.4.4 | ||||
Rhombic figures config. | V3.4.4.4 | V4.4.4.4 | V5.4.4.4 | V6.4.4.4 | V7.4.4.4 | V8.4.4.4 | V∞.4.4.4 |
It shares its vertex arrangement with three nonconvex uniform polyhedra: the stellated truncated hexahedron, the small rhombihexahedron (having the triangular faces and six square faces in common), and the small cubicuboctahedron (having twelve square faces in common).
Rhombicuboctahedron | Small cubicuboctahedron | Small rhombihexahedron | Stellated truncated hexahedron |
Rhombicuboctahedral graph | |
---|---|
Vertices | 24 |
Edges | 48 |
Automorphisms | 48 |
Properties | Quartic graph, Hamiltonian, regular |
Table of graphs and parameters |
The rhombicuboctahedral graph is the graph of vertices and edges of the rhombicuboctahedron. It has 24 vertices and 48 edges, and is a quartic Archimedean graph. [7]
In geometry, an Archimedean solid is one of 13 convex polyhedra whose faces are regular polygons and whose vertices are all symmetric to each other. They were first enumerated by Archimedes. They belong to the class of convex uniform polyhedra, the convex polyhedra with regular faces and symmetric vertices, which is divided into the Archimedean solids, the five Platonic solids, and the two infinite families of prisms and antiprisms. The pseudorhombicuboctahedron is an extra polyhedron with regular faces and congruent vertices, but it is not generally counted as an Archimedean solid because it is not vertex-transitive. An even larger class than the convex uniform polyhedra is the Johnson solids, whose regular polygonal faces do not need to meet in identical vertices.
A cuboctahedron is a polyhedron with 8 triangular faces and 6 square faces. A cuboctahedron has 12 identical vertices, with 2 triangles and 2 squares meeting at each, and 24 identical edges, each separating a triangle from a square. As such, it is a quasiregular polyhedron, i.e. an Archimedean solid that is not only vertex-transitive but also edge-transitive. It is radially equilateral.
In geometry, a cube is a three-dimensional solid object bounded by six square faces, facets, or sides, with three meeting at each vertex. Viewed from a corner, it is a hexagon and its net is usually depicted as a cross.
In geometry, an icosidodecahedron is a polyhedron with twenty (icosi) triangular faces and twelve (dodeca) pentagonal faces. An icosidodecahedron has 30 identical vertices, with two triangles and two pentagons meeting at each, and 60 identical edges, each separating a triangle from a pentagon. As such it is one of the Archimedean solids and more particularly, a quasiregular polyhedron.
In geometry, an octahedron is a polyhedron with eight faces. The term is most commonly used to refer to the regular octahedron, a Platonic solid composed of eight equilateral triangles, four of which meet at each vertex.
In geometry, the snub cube, or snub cuboctahedron, is an Archimedean solid with 38 faces: 6 squares and 32 equilateral triangles. It has 60 edges and 24 vertices.
In geometry, the truncated tetrahedron is an Archimedean solid. It has 4 regular hexagonal faces, 4 equilateral triangle faces, 12 vertices and 18 edges. It can be constructed by truncating all 4 vertices of a regular tetrahedron at one third of the original edge length.
In geometry, the truncated octahedron is the Archimedean solid that arises from a regular octahedron by removing six pyramids, one at each of the octahedron's vertices. The truncated octahedron has 14 faces, 36 edges, and 24 vertices. Since each of its faces has point symmetry the truncated octahedron is a 6-zonohedron. It is also the Goldberg polyhedron GIV(1,1), containing square and hexagonal faces. Like the cube, it can tessellate 3-dimensional space, as a permutohedron.
In geometry, the truncated cube, or truncated hexahedron, is an Archimedean solid. It has 14 regular faces, 36 edges, and 24 vertices.
In geometry, the truncated cuboctahedron or great rhombicuboctahedron is an Archimedean solid, named by Kepler as a truncation of a cuboctahedron. It has 12 square faces, 8 regular hexagonal faces, 6 regular octagonal faces, 48 vertices, and 72 edges. Since each of its faces has point symmetry, the truncated cuboctahedron is a 9-zonohedron. The truncated cuboctahedron can tessellate with the octagonal prism.
In geometry, the rhombic dodecahedron is a convex polyhedron with 12 congruent rhombic faces. It has 24 edges, and 14 vertices of 2 types. It is a Catalan solid, and the dual polyhedron of the cuboctahedron.
In geometry, a tetrakis hexahedron is a Catalan solid. Its dual is the truncated octahedron, an Archimedean solid.
In geometry, the deltoidal icositetrahedron is a Catalan solid. Its 24 faces are congruent kites. The deltoidal icositetrahedron, whose dual is the (uniform) rhombicuboctahedron, is tightly related to the pseudo-deltoidal icositetrahedron, whose dual is the pseudorhombicuboctahedron; but the actual and pseudo-d.i. are not to be confused with each other.
In geometry, a disdyakis dodecahedron,, is a Catalan solid with 48 faces and the dual to the Archimedean truncated cuboctahedron. As such it is face-transitive but with irregular face polygons. It resembles an augmented rhombic dodecahedron. Replacing each face of the rhombic dodecahedron with a flat pyramid creates a polyhedron that looks almost like the disdyakis dodecahedron, and is topologically equivalent to it.
In geometry, a uniform polyhedron has regular polygons as faces and is vertex-transitive. It follows that all vertices are congruent.
In geometry and topology, Conway polyhedron notation, invented by John Horton Conway and promoted by George W. Hart, is used to describe polyhedra based on a seed polyhedron modified by various prefix operations.
In geometry, the Waterman polyhedra are a family of polyhedra discovered around 1990 by the mathematician Steve Waterman. A Waterman polyhedron is created by packing spheres according to the cubic close(st) packing (CCP), also known as the face-centered cubic (fcc) packing, then sweeping away the spheres that are farther from the center than a defined radius, then creating the convex hull of the sphere centers.
The truncated rhombicuboctahedron is a polyhedron, constructed as a truncation of the rhombicuboctahedron. It has 50 faces consisting of 18 octagons, 8 hexagons, and 24 squares. It can fill space with the truncated cube, truncated tetrahedron and triangular prism as a truncated runcic cubic honeycomb.
The expanded cuboctahedron is a polyhedron constructed by expansion of the cuboctahedron. It has 50 faces: 8 triangles, 30 squares, and 12 rhombs. The 48 vertices exist at two sets of 24, with a slightly different distance from its center.
In geometry, chamfering or edge-truncation is a topological operator that modifies one polyhedron into another. It is similar to expansion, moving faces apart and outward, but also maintains the original vertices. For polyhedra, this operation adds a new hexagonal face in place of each original edge.