In mathematics, a spiral is a curve which emanates from a point, moving further away as it revolves around the point. [1] [2] [3] [4] It is a subtype of whorled patterns, a broad group that also includes concentric objects.
Two major definitions of "spiral" in the American Heritage Dictionary are: [5]
The first definition describes a planar curve, that extends in both of the perpendicular directions within its plane; the groove on one side of a gramophone record closely approximates a plane spiral (and it is by the finite width and depth of the groove, but not by the wider spacing between than within tracks, that it falls short of being a perfect example); note that successive loops differ in diameter. In another example, the "center lines" of the arms of a spiral galaxy trace logarithmic spirals.
The second definition includes two kinds of 3-dimensional relatives of spirals:
In the side picture, the black curve at the bottom is an Archimedean spiral, while the green curve is a helix. The curve shown in red is a conical spiral.
A two-dimensional, or plane, spiral may be easily described using polar coordinates, where the radius is a monotonic continuous function of angle :
The circle would be regarded as a degenerate case (the function not being strictly monotonic, but rather constant).
In --coordinates the curve has the parametric representation:
Some of the most important sorts of two-dimensional spirals include:
An Archimedean spiral is, for example, generated while coiling a carpet. [6]
A hyperbolic spiral appears as image of a helix with a special central projection (see diagram). A hyperbolic spiral is some times called reciproke spiral, because it is the image of an Archimedean spiral with a circle-inversion (see below). [7]
The name logarithmic spiral is due to the equation . Approximations of this are found in nature.
Spirals which do not fit into this scheme of the first 5 examples:
A Cornu spiral has two asymptotic points.
The spiral of Theodorus is a polygon.
The Fibonacci Spiral consists of a sequence of circle arcs.
The involute of a circle looks like an Archimedean, but is not: see Involute#Examples.
The following considerations are dealing with spirals, which can be described by a polar equation , especially for the cases (Archimedean, hyperbolic, Fermat's, lituus spirals) and the logarithmic spiral .
The angle between the spiral tangent and the corresponding polar circle (see diagram) is called angle of the polar slope and the polar slope.
From vector calculus in polar coordinates one gets the formula
Hence the slope of the spiral is
In case of an Archimedean spiral () the polar slope is
In a logarithmic spiral, is constant.
The curvature of a curve with polar equation is
For a spiral with one gets
In case of (Archimedean spiral).
Only for the spiral has an inflection point.
The curvature of a logarithmic spiral is
The area of a sector of a curve (see diagram) with polar equation is
For a spiral with equation one gets
The formula for a logarithmic spiral is
The length of an arc of a curve with polar equation is
For the spiral the length is
Not all these integrals can be solved by a suitable table. In case of a Fermat's spiral, the integral can be expressed by elliptic integrals only.
The arc length of a logarithmic spiral is
The inversion at the unit circle has in polar coordinates the simple description: .
The function of a spiral is usually strictly monotonic, continuous and unbounded. For the standard spirals is either a power function or an exponential function. If one chooses for a bounded function, the spiral is bounded, too. A suitable bounded function is the arctan function:
Setting and the choice gives a spiral, that starts at the origin (like an Archimedean spiral) and approaches the circle with radius (diagram, left).
For and one gets a spiral, that approaches the origin (like a hyperbolic spiral) and approaches the circle with radius (diagram, right).
Two well-known spiral space curves are conical spirals and spherical spirals, defined below. Another instance of space spirals is the toroidal spiral. [8] A spiral wound around a helix, [9] also known as double-twisted helix, [10] represents objects such as coiled coil filaments.
If in the --plane a spiral with parametric representation
is given, then there can be added a third coordinate , such that the now space curve lies on the cone with equation :
Spirals based on this procedure are called conical spirals.
Starting with an archimedean spiral one gets the conical spiral (see diagram)
Any cylindrical map projection can be used as the basis for a spherical spiral: draw a straight line on the map and find its inverse projection on the sphere, a kind of spherical curve.
One of the most basic families of spherical spirals is the Clelia curves, which project to straight lines on an equirectangular projection. These are curves for which longitude and colatitude are in a linear relationship, analogous to Archimedean spirals in the plane; under the azimuthal equidistant projection a Clelia curve projects to a planar Archimedean spiral.
If one represents a unit sphere by spherical coordinates
then setting the linear dependency for the angle coordinates gives a parametric curve in terms of parameter , [11]
Another family of spherical spirals is the rhumb lines or loxodromes, that project to straight lines on the Mercator projection. These are the trajectories traced by a ship traveling with constant bearing. Any loxodrome (except for the meridians and parallels) spirals infinitely around either pole, closer and closer each time, unlike a Clelia curve which maintains uniform spacing in colatitude. Under stereographic projection, a loxodrome projects to a logarithmic spiral in the plane.
The study of spirals in nature has a long history. Christopher Wren observed that many shells form a logarithmic spiral; Jan Swammerdam observed the common mathematical characteristics of a wide range of shells from Helix to Spirula ; and Henry Nottidge Moseley described the mathematics of univalve shells. D’Arcy Wentworth Thompson's On Growth and Form gives extensive treatment to these spirals. He describes how shells are formed by rotating a closed curve around a fixed axis: the shape of the curve remains fixed, but its size grows in a geometric progression. In some shells, such as Nautilus and ammonites, the generating curve revolves in a plane perpendicular to the axis and the shell will form a planar discoid shape. In others it follows a skew path forming a helico-spiral pattern. Thompson also studied spirals occurring in horns, teeth, claws and plants. [12]
A model for the pattern of florets in the head of a sunflower [13] was proposed by H. Vogel. This has the form
where n is the index number of the floret and c is a constant scaling factor, and is a form of Fermat's spiral. The angle 137.5° is the golden angle which is related to the golden ratio and gives a close packing of florets. [14]
Spirals in plants and animals are frequently described as whorls. This is also the name given to spiral shaped fingerprints.
A spiral like form has been found in Mezine, Ukraine, as part of a decorative object dated to 10,000 BCE.[ citation needed ] Spiral and triple spiral motifs served as Neolithic symbols in Europe (Megalithic Temples of Malta). The Celtic triple-spiral is in fact a pre-Celtic symbol. [15] It is carved into the rock of a stone lozenge near the main entrance of the prehistoric Newgrange monument in County Meath, Ireland. Newgrange was built around 3200 BCE, predating the Celts; triple spirals were carved at least 2,500 years before the Celts reached Ireland, but have long since become part of Celtic culture. [16] The triskelion symbol, consisting of three interlocked spirals or three bent human legs, appears in many early cultures: examples include Mycenaean vessels, coinage from Lycia, staters of Pamphylia (at Aspendos, 370–333 BC) and Pisidia, as well as the heraldic emblem on warriors' shields depicted on Greek pottery. [17]
Spirals occur commonly in pre-Columbian art in Latin and Central America. The more than 1,400 petroglyphs (rock engravings) in Las Plazuelas, Guanajuato Mexico, dating 750-1200 AD, predominantly depict spirals, dot figures and scale models. [18] In Colombia, monkeys, frog and lizard-like figures depicted in petroglyphs or as gold offering-figures frequently include spirals, for example on the palms of hands. [19] In Lower Central America, spirals along with circles, wavy lines, crosses and points are universal petroglyph characters. [20] Spirals also appear among the Nazca Lines in the coastal desert of Peru, dating from 200 BC to 500 AD. The geoglyphs number in the thousands and depict animals, plants and geometric motifs, including spirals. [21]
Spiral shapes, including the swastika, triskele, etc., have often been interpreted as solar symbols.[ citation needed ] Roof tiles dating back to the Tang dynasty with this symbol have been found west of the ancient city of Chang'an (modern-day Xi'an).[ citation needed ][ year needed ]
Spirals are also a symbol of hypnosis, stemming from the cliché of people and cartoon characters being hypnotized by staring into a spinning spiral (one example being Kaa in Disney's The Jungle Book). They are also used as a symbol of dizziness, where the eyes of a cartoon character, especially in anime and manga, will turn into spirals to suggest that they are dizzy or dazed. The spiral is also found in structures as small as the double helix of DNA and as large as a galaxy. Due to this frequent natural occurrence, the spiral is the official symbol of the World Pantheist Movement. [22] The spiral is also a symbol of the dialectic process and of Dialectical monism.
The spiral is a frequent symbol for spiritual purification, both within Christianity and beyond (one thinks of the spiral as the neo-Platonist symbol for prayer and contemplation, circling around a subject and ascending at the same time, and as a Buddhist symbol for the gradual process on the Path to Enlightenment). [...] while a helix is repetitive, a spiral expands and thus epitomizes growth - conceptually ad infinitum. [23]
The spiral has inspired artists throughout the ages. Among the most famous of spiral-inspired art is Robert Smithson's earthwork, "Spiral Jetty", at the Great Salt Lake in Utah. [24] The spiral theme is also present in David Wood's Spiral Resonance Field at the Balloon Museum in Albuquerque, as well as in the critically acclaimed Nine Inch Nails 1994 concept album The Downward Spiral . The Spiral is also a prominent theme in the anime Gurren Lagann , where it represents a philosophy and way of life. It also central in Mario Merz and Andy Goldsworthy's work. The spiral is the central theme of the horror manga Uzumaki by Junji Ito, where a small coastal town is afflicted by a curse involving spirals. 2012 A Piece of Mind By Wayne A Beale also depicts a large spiral in this book of dreams and images. [25] [ full citation needed ] [26] [ verification needed ] The coiled spiral is a central image in Australian artist Tanja Stark's Suburban Gothic iconography, that incorporates spiral electric stove top elements as symbols of domestic alchemy and spirituality. [27] [28]
In mathematics, the polar coordinate system is a two-dimensional coordinate system in which each point on a plane is determined by a distance from a reference point and an angle from a reference direction. The reference point is called the pole, and the ray from the pole in the reference direction is the polar axis. The distance from the pole is called the radial coordinate, radial distance or simply radius, and the angle is called the angular coordinate, polar angle, or azimuth. Angles in polar notation are generally expressed in either degrees or radians.
In mathematics, a spherical coordinate system is a coordinate system for three-dimensional space where the position of a given point in space is specified by three real numbers: the radial distancer along the radial line connecting the point to the fixed point of origin; the polar angleθ between the radial line and a given polar axis; and the azimuthal angleφ as the angle of rotation of the radial line around the polar axis. (See graphic regarding the "physics convention".) Once the radius is fixed, the three coordinates (r, θ, φ), known as a 3-tuple, provide a coordinate system on a sphere, typically called the spherical polar coordinates. The plane passing through the origin and perpendicular to the polar axis (where the polar angle is a right angle) is called the reference plane (sometimes fundamental plane).
A logarithmic spiral, equiangular spiral, or growth spiral is a self-similar spiral curve that often appears in nature. The first to describe a logarithmic spiral was Albrecht Dürer (1525) who called it an "eternal line". More than a century later, the curve was discussed by Descartes (1638), and later extensively investigated by Jacob Bernoulli, who called it Spira mirabilis, "the marvelous spiral".
The Archimedean spiral (also known as Archimedes' spiral, the arithmetic spiral) is a spiral named after the 3rd-century BC Greek mathematician Archimedes. The term Archimedean spiral is sometimes used to refer to the more general class of spirals of this type (see below), in contrast to Archimedes' spiral (the specific arithmetic spiral of Archimedes). It is the locus corresponding to the locations over time of a point moving away from a fixed point with a constant speed along a line that rotates with constant angular velocity. Equivalently, in polar coordinates (r, θ) it can be described by the equation with real number b. Changing the parameter b controls the distance between loops.
An ellipsoid is a surface that can be obtained from a sphere by deforming it by means of directional scalings, or more generally, of an affine transformation.
In mathematics, a unit vector in a normed vector space is a vector of length 1. A unit vector is often denoted by a lowercase letter with a circumflex, or "hat", as in .
A hyperbolic spiral is a type of spiral with a pitch angle that increases with distance from its center, unlike the constant angles of logarithmic spirals or decreasing angles of Archimedean spirals. As this curve widens, it approaches an asymptotic line. It can be found in the view up a spiral staircase and the starting arrangement of certain footraces, and is used to model spiral galaxies and architectural volutes.
A Fermat's spiral or parabolic spiral is a plane curve with the property that the area between any two consecutive full turns around the spiral is invariant. As a result, the distance between turns grows in inverse proportion to their distance from the spiral center, contrasting with the Archimedean spiral and the logarithmic spiral. Fermat spirals are named after Pierre de Fermat.
In geometry, a cardioid is a plane curve traced by a point on the perimeter of a circle that is rolling around a fixed circle of the same radius. It can also be defined as an epicycloid having a single cusp. It is also a type of sinusoidal spiral, and an inverse curve of the parabola with the focus as the center of inversion. A cardioid can also be defined as the set of points of reflections of a fixed point on a circle through all tangents to the circle.
In geometry, a nephroid is a specific plane curve. It is a type of epicycloid in which the smaller circle's radius differs from the larger one by a factor of one-half.
In trigonometry, tangent half-angle formulas relate the tangent of half of an angle to trigonometric functions of the entire angle.
In mathematics and physics, the Christoffel symbols are an array of numbers describing a metric connection. The metric connection is a specialization of the affine connection to surfaces or other manifolds endowed with a metric, allowing distances to be measured on that surface. In differential geometry, an affine connection can be defined without reference to a metric, and many additional concepts follow: parallel transport, covariant derivatives, geodesics, etc. also do not require the concept of a metric. However, when a metric is available, these concepts can be directly tied to the "shape" of the manifold itself; that shape is determined by how the tangent space is attached to the cotangent space by the metric tensor. Abstractly, one would say that the manifold has an associated (orthonormal) frame bundle, with each "frame" being a possible choice of a coordinate frame. An invariant metric implies that the structure group of the frame bundle is the orthogonal group O(p, q). As a result, such a manifold is necessarily a (pseudo-)Riemannian manifold. The Christoffel symbols provide a concrete representation of the connection of (pseudo-)Riemannian geometry in terms of coordinates on the manifold. Additional concepts, such as parallel transport, geodesics, etc. can then be expressed in terms of Christoffel symbols.
In mathematics, a Clélie or Clelia curve is a curve on a sphere with the property:
In mathematics, Viviani's curve, also known as Viviani's window, is a figure eight shaped space curve named after the Italian mathematician Vincenzo Viviani. It is the intersection of a sphere with a cylinder that is tangent to the sphere and passes through two poles of the sphere. Before Viviani this curve was studied by Simon de La Loubère and Gilles de Roberval.
In geometric topology, the Clifford torus is the simplest and most symmetric flat embedding of the Cartesian product of two circles S1
a and S1
b. It is named after William Kingdon Clifford. It resides in R4, as opposed to in R3. To see why R4 is necessary, note that if S1
a and S1
b each exists in its own independent embedding space R2
a and R2
b, the resulting product space will be R4 rather than R3. The historically popular view that the Cartesian product of two circles is an R3 torus in contrast requires the highly asymmetric application of a rotation operator to the second circle, since that circle will only have one independent axis z available to it after the first circle consumes x and y.
In geometry, the tangential angle of a curve in the Cartesian plane, at a specific point, is the angle between the tangent line to the curve at the given point and the x-axis.
The goat grazing problem is either of two related problems in recreational mathematics involving a tethered goat grazing a circular area: the interior grazing problem and the exterior grazing problem. The former involves grazing the interior of a circular area, and the latter, grazing an exterior of a circular area. For the exterior problem, the constraint that the rope can not enter the circular area dictates that the grazing area forms an involute. If the goat were instead tethered to a post on the edge of a circular path of pavement that did not obstruct the goat, the interior and exterior problem would be complements of a simple circular area.
In algebraic geometry, the sinusoidal spirals are a family of curves defined by the equation in polar coordinates
In geometry, a sectrix of Maclaurin is defined as the curve swept out by the point of intersection of two lines which are each revolving at constant rates about different points called poles. Equivalently, a sectrix of Maclaurin can be defined as a curve whose equation in biangular coordinates is linear. The name is derived from the trisectrix of Maclaurin, which is a prominent member of the family, and their sectrix property, which means they can be used to divide an angle into a given number of equal parts. There are special cases known as arachnida or araneidans because of their spider-like shape, and Plateau curves after Joseph Plateau who studied them.
In mathematics, a conical spiral, also known as a conical helix, is a space curve on a right circular cone, whose floor projection is a plane spiral. If the floor projection is a logarithmic spiral, it is called conchospiral.