English

Poncelet Triangles: a Theory for Locus Ellipticity

Metric Geometry 2021-12-14 v4 Computational Geometry Robotics Algebraic Geometry Dynamical Systems

Abstract

We present a theory which predicts if the locus of a triangle center over certain Poncelet triangle families is a conic or not. We consider families interscribed in (i) the confocal pair and (ii) an outer ellipse and an inner concentric circular caustic. Previously, determining if a locus was a conic was done on a case-by-case basis. In the confocal case, we also derive conditions under which a locus degenerates to a segment or a circle. We show the locus' turning number is +/- 3, while predicting its monotonicity with respect to the motion of a vertex of the triangle family.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2106.00715,
  title  = {Poncelet Triangles: a Theory for Locus Ellipticity},
  author = {Mark Helman and Dominique Laurain and Dan Reznik and Ronaldo Garcia},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2106.00715},
  year   = {2021}
}

Comments

10 pages, 5 figures, 2 tables, and 6 video links

R2 v1 2026-06-24T02:43:24.415Z