In geometry, the nine-point circle is a circle that can be constructed for any given triangle. It is so named because it passes through nine significant concyclic points defined from the triangle. These nine points are:
The nine-point circle is also known as Feuerbach's circle (after Karl Wilhelm Feuerbach), Euler's circle (after Leonhard Euler), Terquem's circle (after Olry Terquem), the six-points circle, the twelve-points circle, the n-point circle, the medioscribed circle, the mid circle or the circum-midcircle. Its center is the nine-point center of the triangle. [3] [4]
The diagram above shows the nine significant points of the nine-point circle. Points D, E, F are the midpoints of the three sides of the triangle. Points G, H, I are the feet of the altitudes of the triangle. Points J, K, L are the midpoints of the line segments between each altitude's vertex intersection (points A, B, C) and the triangle's orthocenter (point S).
For an acute triangle, six of the points (the midpoints and altitude feet) lie on the triangle itself; for an obtuse triangle two of the altitudes have feet outside the triangle, but these feet still belong to the nine-point circle.
Although he is credited for its discovery, Karl Wilhelm Feuerbach did not entirely discover the nine-point circle, but rather the six-point circle, recognizing the significance of the midpoints of the three sides of the triangle and the feet of the altitudes of that triangle. (See Fig. 1, pointsD, E, F, G, H, I.) (At a slightly earlier date, Charles Brianchon and Jean-Victor Poncelet had stated and proven the same theorem.) But soon after Feuerbach, mathematician Olry Terquem himself proved the existence of the circle. He was the first to recognize the added significance of the three midpoints between the triangle's vertices and the orthocenter. (See Fig. 1, pointsJ, K, L.) Thus, Terquem was the first to use the name nine-point circle.
In 1822 Karl Feuerbach discovered that any triangle's nine-point circle is externally tangent to that triangle's three excircles and internally tangent to its incircle; this result is known as Feuerbach's theorem. He proved that:
... the circle which passes through the feet of the altitudes of a triangle is tangent to all four circles which in turn are tangent to the three sides of the triangle…
The triangle center at which the incircle and the nine-point circle touch is called the Feuerbach point.
The circle is an instance of a conic section and the nine-point circle is an instance of the general nine-point conic that has been constructed with relation to a triangle △ABC and a fourth point P, where the particular nine-point circle instance arises when P is the orthocenter of △ABC. The vertices of the triangle and P determine a complete quadrilateral and three "diagonal points" where opposite sides of the quadrilateral intersect. There are six "sidelines" in the quadrilateral; the nine-point conic intersects the midpoints of these and also includes the diagonal points. The conic is an ellipse when P is interior to △ABC or in a region sharing vertical angles with the triangle, but a nine-point hyperbola occurs when P is in one of the three adjacent regions, and the hyperbola is rectangular when P lies on the circumcircle of △ABC.
A triangle is a polygon with three edges and three vertices. It is one of the basic shapes in geometry. A triangle with vertices A, B, and C is denoted .
In elementary geometry, two geometric objects are perpendicular if they intersect at a right angle. The condition of perpendicularity may be represented graphically using the perpendicular symbol, ⟂. It can be defined between two lines, between a line and a plane, and between two planes.
In geometry, an altitude of a triangle is a line segment through a vertex and perpendicular to a line containing the base. This line containing the opposite side is called the extended base of the altitude. The intersection of the extended base and the altitude is called the foot of the altitude. The length of the altitude, often simply called "the altitude", is the distance between the extended base and the vertex. The process of drawing the altitude from the vertex to the foot is known as dropping the altitude at that vertex. It is a special case of orthogonal projection.
In geometry, the incircle or inscribed circle of a triangle is the largest circle that can be contained in the triangle; it touches the three sides. The center of the incircle is a triangle center called the triangle's incenter.
In geometry, an orthocentric system is a set of four points on a plane, one of which is the orthocenter of the triangle formed by the other three.
In Euclidean geometry, a cyclic quadrilateral or inscribed quadrilateral is a quadrilateral whose vertices all lie on a single circle. This circle is called the circumcircle or circumscribed circle, and the vertices are said to be concyclic. The center of the circle and its radius are called the circumcenter and the circumradius respectively. Other names for these quadrilaterals are concyclic quadrilateral and chordal quadrilateral, the latter since the sides of the quadrilateral are chords of the circumcircle. Usually the quadrilateral is assumed to be convex, but there are also crossed cyclic quadrilaterals. The formulas and properties given below are valid in the convex case.
In geometry, the Euler line, named after Leonhard Euler, is a line determined from any triangle that is not equilateral. It is a central line of the triangle, and it passes through several important points determined from the triangle, including the orthocenter, the circumcenter, the centroid, the Exeter point and the center of the nine-point circle of the triangle.
In geometry, the midpoint is the middle point of a line segment. It is equidistant from both endpoints, and it is the centroid both of the segment and of the endpoints. It bisects the segment.
In geometry, a set of points are said to be concyclic if they lie on a common circle. All concyclic points are at the same distance from the center of the circle. Three points in the plane that do not all fall on a straight line are concyclic, but four or more such points in the plane are not necessarily concyclic.
In geometry, lines in a plane or higher-dimensional space are said to be concurrent if they intersect at a single point. They are in contrast to parallel lines.
In geometry, collinearity of a set of points is the property of their lying on a single line. A set of points with this property is said to be collinear. In greater generality, the term has been used for aligned objects, that is, things being "in a line" or "in a row".
In geometry, given a triangle ABC and a point P on its circumcircle, the three closest points to P on lines AB, AC, and BC are collinear. The line through these points is the Simson line of P, named for Robert Simson. The concept was first published, however, by William Wallace in 1799.
In geometry, the nine-point center is a triangle center, a point defined from a given triangle in a way that does not depend on the placement or scale of the triangle. It is so called because it is the center of the nine-point circle, a circle that passes through nine significant points of the triangle: the midpoints of the three edges, the feet of the three altitudes, and the points halfway between the orthocenter and each of the three vertices. The nine-point center is listed as point X(5) in Clark Kimberling's Encyclopedia of Triangle Centers.
In geometry, a centre of an object is a point in some sense in the middle of the object. According to the specific definition of center taken into consideration, an object might have no center. If geometry is regarded as the study of isometry groups, then a center is a fixed point of all the isometries that move the object onto itself.
In geometry, the Poncelet point of four given points is defined as follows:
In Euclidean geometry, a circumconic is a conic section that passes through the three vertices of a triangle, and an inconic is a conic section inscribed in the sides, possibly extended, of a triangle.
In plane geometry with triangle ABC, the nine-point hyperbola is an instance of the nine-point conic described by Maxime Bôcher in 1892. The celebrated nine-point circle is a separate instance of Bôcher's conic:
In geometry, the polar circle of a triangle is the circle whose center is the triangle's orthocenter and whose squared radius is
In geometry, the Newton–Gauss line is the line joining the midpoints of the three diagonals of a complete quadrilateral.
In geometry, the Feuerbach hyperbola is a rectangular hyperbola passing through important triangle centers such as the Orthocenter, Gergonne point, Nagel point and Shiffler point. The center of the hyperbola is the Feuerbach point, the point of tangency of the incircle and the nine-point circle.