Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-mp689 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-24T15:35:53.667Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The aberrancy of plane curves

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2016

Russell A. Gordon*
Affiliation:
Dept of Mathematics, Whitman College, Walla Walla, WA 99362 USA

Extract

The aberrancy of a plane curve is a property of the curve that is invariant under both translation and rotation. It provides a numerical measure for the non-circularity of the curve at each point of the curve. (Recall that curvature gives an invariant numerical measure of nonlinearity.) The concept of aberrancy has been around for two centuries, but it has received very little attention. We hope to stir a little interest in the concept by presenting four different derivations of the formula for aberrancy. This may appear to be redundant, but there are some good reasons for doing so. First of all, the only derivation for aberrancy in the literature is a bit confusing and makes a few unjustified assumptions. Secondly, the derivations we present are all significantly different from each other and involve some interesting ideas in elementary real analysis. Finally, although the basic idea behind each derivation is simple, the details can become extremely messy unless a proper path is chosen. We encourage the reader to find one or two approaches of particular interest and use the concept of aberrancy as an extended problem set in an undergraduate analysis course or even a further mathematics class in an English school.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The Mathematical Association 2004

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Schot, S., Aberrancy: geometry of the third derivative, Math. Mag., 51 (1978) pp. 259275.Google Scholar
2. Transon, A., Recherches sur la courbure des lignes et des surfaces, Journal de mathématiques pures and appliquées 6 (1841) pp. 191208.Google Scholar
3. Salmon, G., A treatise on the higher plane curves, G. E. Stechert, New York (1934).Google Scholar
4. Walker, A., The differential equation of a conic and its relation to aberrancy, Amer. Math. Monthly, 59 (1952) pp. 531539.Google Scholar
5. Boyer, C., Carnot and the concept of deviation, Amer. Math. Monthly, 61 (1954) pp. 459463.Google Scholar
6. Edwards, S. and Gordon, R., Extreme curvature of polynomials, Amer. Math. Monthly, 111 (2004) pp. 890899.Google Scholar
7. Burgette, L. and Gordon, R., On determining the non-circularity of a plane curve, College Math. J., 35 (2004) pp. 7484.Google Scholar