Ellipse (Noun)
Meaning
A closed plane curve resulting from the intersection of a circular cone and a plane cutting completely through it; "the sums of the distances from the foci to any point on an ellipse is constant".
Classification
Nouns denoting two and three dimensional shapes.
Examples
- The equation of an ellipse is often written in the form (x^2/a^2) + (y^2/b^2) = 1.
- An ellipse has two foci whose sum of distances to any point on the curve is always the same.
- In astronomy, the orbits of the planets are approximately ellipses with the Sun at one of the foci.
- The artist used a technique involving ellipses to create the illusion of three-dimensional perspective on a flat canvas.
- In mathematics, an ellipse is defined as the set of all points in a plane such that the sum of the distances from two fixed points is constant.