Toroid

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A toroid using a square. Toroid by Zureks.svg
A toroid using a square.
A torus is a type of toroid. Torus.png
A torus is a type of toroid.

In mathematics, a toroid is a surface of revolution with a hole in the middle. The axis of revolution passes through the hole and so does not intersect the surface. [1] For example, when a rectangle is rotated around an axis parallel to one of its edges, then a hollow rectangle-section ring is produced. If the revolved figure is a circle, then the object is called a torus.

Contents

The term toroid is also used to describe a toroidal polyhedron. In this context a toroid need not be circular and may have any number of holes. A g-holed toroid can be seen as approximating the surface of a torus having a topological genus, g, of 1 or greater. The Euler characteristic χ of a g holed toroid is 2(1-g). [2]

The torus is an example of a toroid, which is the surface of a doughnut. Doughnuts are an example of a solid torus created by rotating a disk, and are not toroids.

Toroidal structures occur in both natural and synthetic materials. [3]

Equations

A toroid is specified by the radius of revolution R measured from the center of the section rotated. For symmetrical sections volume and surface of the body may be computed (with circumference C and area A of the section):

Square toroid

The volume (V) and surface area (S) of a toroid are given by the following equations, where A is the area of the square section of side, and R is the radius of revolution.

Circular toroid

The volume (V) and surface area (S) of a toroid are given by the following equations, where r is the radius of the circular section, and R is the radius of the overall shape.

Pappus's centroid theorem generalizes the formulas here to arbitrary surfaces of revolution.

See also

Notes

  1. Weisstein, Eric W. "Toroid". MathWorld .
  2. Stewart, B.; "Adventures Among the Toroids:A Study of Orientable Polyhedra with Regular Faces", 2nd Edition, Stewart (1980).
  3. Carroll, Gregory T.; Jongejan, Mahthild G. M.; Pijper, Dirk; Feringa, Ben L. (2010). "Spontaneous generation and patterning of chiral polymeric surface toroids". Chemical Science. 1 (4): 469. doi:10.1039/c0sc00159g. ISSN   2041-6520.