Newton's Method of Drawing the Cissoid of Diocles

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This Demonstration shows Newton's method of drawing the cissoid of Diocles. The length of and the point are fixed. As you drag on the straight line , is kept perpendicular to . The midpoint of traces out the cissoid.

Contributed by: Izidor Hafner (September 2012)
Open content licensed under CC BY-NC-SA


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Details

According to [1], the method uses two line segments of equal length at right angles. If they are moved so that one line always passes through a fixed point and the end of the other line segment slides along a straight line, then the mid-point of the sliding line segment traces out a cissoid of Diocles.

Reference

[1] J. J. O'Connor and E. F. Robertson. "Cissoid of Diocles." (Jan 1997) www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/Curves/Cissoid.html.



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