Up: The Pseudosphere

The Tractrix

The tractrix is a curve with the property that the length of the segment of the tangent line from any point on the curve to the y axis is constantly equal to 1. One way to parametrize the tractrix is:

tractrix(t)=(sint,cost+log(tan(t/2)))     0 < t < pi

The tractrix is a regular curve except at t=pi/2. It approaches the y axis asymptotically and passes through the point: tractix(pi/2)=(1,0).


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Created: Jul 14 1995 ---- Last modified: Fri Nov 17 15:17:13 1995
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