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In geometry, a side of a triangle subtends (from Latin for "stretch under") the opposite angle, and in particular a chord of a circle subtends the central angle formed by the radii through its endpoints. The same concept has been generalized beyond line segments, and an arc of a curve is said to subtend an angle if its endpoints lie on the two rays forming the angle. A chord of a circle or arbitrary curve is also said to subtend the corresponding arc of the curve.
If a straight or curved segment subtends an angle, the angle is subtended by the segment. Sometimes the term subtend is applied in the opposite sense, and the angle is said to subtend the segment. Alternately the angle can be said to intercept or enclose the segment.
Generalized to three-dimensional space, a surface subtends a solid angle if its boundary defines the cone of the angle.
Many theorems in geometry relate to subtended angles. If two sides of a triangle are congruent, then the angles they subtend are also congruent, and conversely if two angles are congruent then they are subtended by congruent sides (propositions I.5–6 in Euclid's Elements), forming an isosceles triangle. More generally, the law of sines states that the sine of each angle of a triangle is proportional to the side subtending it. The inscribed angle theorem states that when the vertex of an angle inscribed in a circle lies on the same side of the chord subtending it as the center of the circle, then the central angle subtended by the same chord is twice the inscribed angle.
A circle is a shape consisting of all points in a plane that are at a given distance from a given point, the centre. The distance between any point of the circle and the centre is called the radius. The length of a line segment connecting two points on the circle and passing through the centre is called the diameter. A circle bounds a region of the plane called a disc.
A triangle is a polygon with three corners and three sides, one of the basic shapes in geometry. The corners, also called vertices, are zero-dimensional points while the sides connecting them, also called edges, are one-dimensional line segments. A triangle has three internal angles, each one bounded by a pair of adjacent edges; the sum of angles of a triangle always equals a straight angle. The triangle is a plane figure and its interior is a planar region. Sometimes an arbitrary edge is chosen to be the base, in which case the opposite vertex is called the apex; the shortest segment between the base and apex is the height. The area of a triangle equals one-half the product of height and base length.
In geometry, two figures or objects are congruent if they have the same shape and size, or if one has the same shape and size as the mirror image of the other.
In Euclidean plane geometry, a rectangle is a rectilinear convex polygon or a quadrilateral with four right angles. It can also be defined as: an equiangular quadrilateral, since equiangular means that all of its angles are equal ; or a parallelogram containing a right angle. A rectangle with four sides of equal length is a square. The term "oblong" is used to refer to a non-square rectangle. A rectangle with vertices ABCD would be denoted as ABCD.
In geometry, two geometric objects are perpendicular if their intersection forms right angles at the point of intersection called a foot. The condition of perpendicularity may be represented graphically using the perpendicular symbol, ⟂. Perpendicular intersections can happen between two lines, between a line and a plane, and between two planes.
In geometry and trigonometry, a right angle is an angle of exactly 90 degrees or /2 radians corresponding to a quarter turn. If a ray is placed so that its endpoint is on a line and the adjacent angles are equal, then they are right angles. The term is a calque of Latin angulus rectus; here rectus means "upright", referring to the vertical perpendicular to a horizontal base line.
In Euclidean geometry, a parallelogram is a simple (non-self-intersecting) quadrilateral with two pairs of parallel sides. The opposite or facing sides of a parallelogram are of equal length and the opposite angles of a parallelogram are of equal measure. The congruence of opposite sides and opposite angles is a direct consequence of the Euclidean parallel postulate and neither condition can be proven without appealing to the Euclidean parallel postulate or one of its equivalent formulations.
In geometry, bisection is the division of something into two equal or congruent parts. Usually it involves a bisecting line, also called a bisector. The most often considered types of bisectors are the segment bisector, a line that passes through the midpoint of a given segment, and the angle bisector, a line that passes through the apex of an angle . In three-dimensional space, bisection is usually done by a bisecting plane, also called the bisector.
In plane Euclidean geometry, a rhombus is a quadrilateral whose four sides all have the same length. Another name is equilateral quadrilateral, since equilateral means that all of its sides are equal in length. The rhombus is often called a "diamond", after the diamonds suit in playing cards which resembles the projection of an octahedral diamond, or a lozenge, though the former sometimes refers specifically to a rhombus with a 60° angle, and the latter sometimes refers specifically to a rhombus with a 45° angle.
A chord of a circle is a straight line segment whose endpoints both lie on a circular arc. If a chord were to be extended infinitely on both directions into a line, the object is a secant line. The perpendicular line passing through the chord's midpoint is called sagitta.
In geometry, a circular segment or disk segment is a region of a disk which is "cut off" from the rest of the disk by a straight line. The complete line is known as a secant, and the section inside the disk as a chord.
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, an inscribed angle is the angle formed in the interior of a circle when two chords intersect on the circle. It can also be defined as the angle subtended at a point on the circle by two given points on the circle.
In geometry, a convex polygon is a polygon that is the boundary of a convex set. This means that the line segment between two points of the polygon is contained in the union of the interior and the boundary of the polygon. In particular, it is a simple polygon. Equivalently, a polygon is convex if every line that does not contain any edge intersects the polygon in at most two points.
In hyperbolic geometry, a hyperbolic triangle is a triangle in the hyperbolic plane. It consists of three line segments called sides or edges and three points called angles or vertices.
A circular arc is the arc of a circle between a pair of distinct points. If the two points are not directly opposite each other, one of these arcs, the minor arc, subtends an angle at the center of the circle that is less than π radians ; and the other arc, the major arc, subtends an angle greater than π radians. The arc of a circle is defined as the part or segment of the circumference of a circle. A straight line that connects the two ends of the arc is known as a chord of a circle. If the length of an arc is exactly half of the circle, it is known as a semicircular arc.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to trigonometry:
Early study of triangles can be traced to the 2nd millennium BC, in Egyptian mathematics and Babylonian mathematics. Trigonometry was also prevalent in Kushite mathematics. Systematic study of trigonometric functions began in Hellenistic mathematics, reaching India as part of Hellenistic astronomy. In Indian astronomy, the study of trigonometric functions flourished in the Gupta period, especially due to Aryabhata, who discovered the sine function, cosine function, and versine function.
In Euclidean geometry, the intersecting chords theorem, or just the chord theorem, is a statement that describes a relation of the four line segments created by two intersecting chords within a circle. It states that the products of the lengths of the line segments on each chord are equal. It is Proposition 35 of Book 3 of Euclid's Elements.
In geometry, a line segment is a part of a straight line that is bounded by two distinct endpoints, and contains every point on the line that is between its endpoints. It is a special case of an arc, with zero curvature. The length of a line segment is given by the Euclidean distance between its endpoints. A closed line segment includes both endpoints, while an open line segment excludes both endpoints; a half-open line segment includes exactly one of the endpoints. In geometry, a line segment is often denoted using an overline (vinculum) above the symbols for the two endpoints, such as in AB.