The Snowflake Curve

1. Start with an equilateral triangle whose sides have length 1. 2. On the middle third of each of the three sides, build an equilateral triangle with sides of length 1/3. Erase the base of each of the three new triangles. 3. On the middle third of each of the twelve sides, build an equilateral triangle with sides of length 1/9. Erase the base of each of the twelve new triangles. 4. Repeat the process with this 48-sided figure. See the likeness to a crystal of snow emerge?

At the right, figure 4 is magnified by a power of two.

The "limit curve" defined by repeating this process an infinite number of times, adding more and more, smaller and smaller triangles at each stage, is called the Koch's SNOWFLAKE CURVE, named after Niels Fabian Helge von Koch (Sweden, 1870-1924).

The snowflake curve has some interesting properties that may seem paradoxical. The snowflake curve is connected in the sense that it does not have any breaks or gaps in it. But it's not smooth (jagged, even), because it has an infinite number of sharp corners in it that are packed together more closely than pebbles on a beach. The snowflake never escapes the dashed square you see in figures 1-4, so it encloses a finite amount of area no larger than a credit card. On the other hand, at each step building the new little

triangles adds more than one unit of length to the curve. To be precise, [4 3]n - 1 units are added at the nth step, so the length of the snowflake is larger than 3 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + ....... = infinity. The snowflake curve is infinitely long, yet it would fit in your wallet! Under a magnifying glass, a little piece of the snowflake looks identical to a larger, unmagnified chunk. Objects that exhibit this kind of self-similarity are called FRACTALS and are of great research and applied interest in modern science and mathematics.

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MEANING OF ITERATION iteration

iteration n. 1. The act or an instance of iterating; repetition. 2. Mathematics A computational procedure in which a cycle of operations is repeated, often to approximate the desired result more closely. 3. Computer Science a. The process of repeating a set of instructions a specified number of times or until a specific result is achieved. b. One cycle of a set of instructions to be repeated: After ten iterations, the program exited the loop. ( t -r sh n)

Transformation (geometry)
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In mathematics, a transformation could be any function mapping a set X on to another set or on to itself. However, often the set X has some additional algebraic or geometric structure and the term "transformation" refers to a function from X to itself which preserves this structure. Examples include linear transformations and affine transformations rotations, reflections and translations. These can be carried out in Euclidean space, particularly in dimensions 2 and 3. They are also operations that can be performed using linear algebra, and described explicitly using matrices.

Contents
[hide]

1 Translation 2 Reflection 3 Glide reflection 4 Rotation 5 Scaling 6 Shear 7 More generally 8 See also

[edit] Translation
Main article: Translation (geometry)

A translation, or translation operator, is an affine transformation of Euclidean space which moves every point by a fixed distance in the same direction. It can also be interpreted as the addition of a constant vector to every point, or as shifting the origin of the coordinate system. In other words, if v is a fixed vector, then the translation Tv will work as Tv(p) = p + v.

[edit] Reflection
Main article: Reflection (mathematics)

A reflection is a map that transforms an object into its mirror image. For example, a reflection of the small English letter p in respect to a vertical line would look like q. In order to reflect a planar figure one needs the "mirror" to be a line ("axis of reflection"), while for reflections in the three-dimensional space one would use a plane for a mirror. Reflection sometimes is considered as a special case of inversion with infinite radius of the reference circle. Or in easier terms a translation is on coordinate grid you slide the figure over on to another coordinate plane.

[edit] Glide reflection

Main article: Glide reflection

Example of a glide reflection

A glide reflection is a type of isometry of the Euclidean plane: the combination of a reflection in a line and a translation along that line. Reversing the order of combining gives the same result. Depending on context, we may consider a reflection a special case, where the translation vector is the zero vector.

[edit] Rotation
Main article: Rotation (geometry)

A rotation is a transformation that is performed by "spinning" the object around a fixed point known as the center of rotation. You can rotate your object at any degree measure, but 90 and 180 are two of the most common. Also, rotations are done counterclockwise (Anticlockwise).

[edit] Scaling
Main article: Scaling (geometry)

Uniform scaling is a linear transformation that enlarges or diminishes objects; the scale factor is the same in all directions; it is also called a homothety. The result of uniform scaling is similar (in the geometric sense) to the original. More general is scaling with a separate scale factor for each axis direction; a special case is directional scaling (in one direction). Shapes not aligned with the axes may be subject to shear (see below) as a side effect: although the angles between lines parallel to the axes are preserved, other angles are not.

[edit] Shear
Main article: Shear mapping

Shear is a transform that effectively rotates one axis so that the axes are no longer perpendicular. Under shear, a rectangle becomes a parallelogram, and a circle becomes an ellipse. Even if lines parallel to the axes stay the same length, others do not. As a mapping of

the plane, it lies in the class of equi-areal mappings.

[edit] More generally

Main article: Linear transformation

More generally, a transformation in mathematics is one facet of the mathematical function; the term mapping is also used in ways that are quite close synonyms. A transformation can be an invertible function from a set X to itself, or from X to another set Y. In a sense the term transformation only flags that a function's more geometric aspects are being considered (for example, with attention paid to invariants).
A strong non-linear transformation applied to a plane through the origin

Before

After

Plane symmetry
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Plane symmetry means a symmetry of a pattern in the Euclidean plane; that is, a transformation of the plane that carries any directioned lines to lines and preserves many different distances. If one has a pattern in the plane, the set of plane symmetries that preserve the pattern forms a group. The groups that arise in this way are plane symmetry groups and are of considerable mathematical interest. There are several kinds of plane symmetry groups:

Reflection groups. These are plane symmetry groups that are generated by reflections, possibly limited to reflections in lines through the origin. Rotation groups. These groups consist of rotations around a point. Translation groups. Symmetries of geometrical figures. Some of these are reflection groups, e.g., the group of symmetries of the square or the rectangle. The symmetry group of a swastika or any similar figure without an axis of symmetry is a rotation group.

The Four Types of Symmetry in the Plane

written by Dr. Susan Addington California Math Show susan@math.csusb.edu http://www.math.csusb.edu/ formatted and edited by Suzanne Alejandre

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A pattern is symmetric if there is at least one symmetry (rotation, translation, reflection, glide reflection) that leaves the pattern unchanged.

Rotation
To rotate an object means to turn it around. Every rotation has a center and an angle.

Translation
To translate an object means to move it without rotating or reflecting it. Every translation has a direction and a distance.

Reflection
To reflect an object means to produce its mirror image. Every reflection has a mirror line. A reflection of an "R" is a backwards "R".

Glide Reflection
A glide reflection combines a reflection with a translation along the direction of the mirror line. Glide reflections are the only type of symmetry that involve more than one step.

Symmetries create patterns that help us organize our world conceptually. Symmetric patterns occur in nature, and are invented by artists, craftspeople, musicians, choreographers, and mathematicians.

In mathematics, the idea of symmetry gives us a precise way to think about this subject. We will talk about plane symmetries, those that take place on a flat plane, but the ideas generalize to spatial symmetries too. Plane symmetry involves moving all points around the plane so that their positions relative to each other remain the same, although their absolute positions may change. Symmetries preserve distances, angles, sizes, and shapes.
1. For example, rotation by 90 degrees about a fixed point is an example of a plane symmetry. 2. Another basic type of symmetry is a reflection. The reflection of a figure in the plane about a line moves its reflected image to where it would appear if you viewed it using a mirror placed on the line. Another way to make a reflection is to fold a piece of paper and trace the figure onto the other side of the fold. 3. A third type of symmetry is translation. Translating an object means moving it without rotating or reflecting it. You can describe a translation by stating how far it moves an object, and in what direction. 4. The fourth (and last) type of symmetry is a glide reflection. A glide reflection combines a reflection with a translation along the direction of the mirror line.

A figure, picture, or pattern is said to be symmetric if there is at least one symmetry that leaves the figure unchanged. For example, the letters in

ATOYOTA
form a symmetric pattern: if you draw a vertical line through the center of the "Y" and then reflect the entire phrase across the line, the left side becomes the right side and vice versa. The picture doesn't change.

If you draw the figure of a person walking and copy it to make a line of walkers going infinitely in both directions, you have made a symmetric pattern. You can translate the whole group ahead one person, and the procession will look the same. This pattern has an infinite number of symmetries, since you can translate forward by one person, two people, or three people, or

backwards by the same numbers, or even by no people. There is one symmetry of this pattern for each integer (positive, negative, and zero whole numbers).

In geometry, a Euclidean plane isometry is an isometry of the Euclidean plane, or more informally, a way of transforming the plane that preserves geometrical properties such as length. There are four types: translations, rotations, reflections, and glide reflections (see below under classification of Euclidean plane isometries). The set of Euclidean plane isometries forms a group under composition: the Euclidean group in two dimensions. It is generated by reflections in lines, and every element of the Euclidean group is the composite of at most three distinct reflections.

Mirror combinations
In the Euclidean plane, we have the following possibilities.

[d ] Identity Two reflections in the same mirror restore each point to its original position. All points are left fixed. Any pair of identical mirrors has the same effect. [db] Reflection As Alice found through the looking-glass, a single mirror causes left and right hands to switch. (In formal terms, topological orientation is reversed.) Points on the mirror are left fixed. Each mirror has a unique effect. [dp] Rotation

Two distinct intersecting mirrors have a single point in common, which remains fixed. All other points rotate around it by twice the angle between the mirrors. Any two mirrors with the same fixed point and same angle give the same rotation, so long as they are used in the correct order. [dd] Translation Two distinct mirrors that do not intersect must be parallel. Every point moves the same amount, twice the distance between the mirrors, and in the same direction. No points are left fixed. Any two mirrors with the same parallel direction and the same distance apart give the same translation, so long as they are used in the correct order. [dq] Glide reflection Three mirrors also entertain Alice (switch hands). If they are all parallel, the effect is the same as a single mirror (slide a pair to cancel the third). Otherwise we can find an equivalent arrangement where two are parallel and the third is perpendicular to them. The effect is a reflection combined with a translation parallel to the mirror. No points are left fixed

Glide reflection
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Example of a glide reflection

In geometry, a glide reflection is a type of isometry of the Euclidean plane: the combination of a reflection in a line and a translation along that line. Reversing the order of combining gives the same result. Depending on context, we may consider a reflection a special case, where the translation vector is the zero vector. The combination of a reflection in a line and a translation in a perpendicular direction is a reflection in a parallel line. However, a glide reflection cannot be reduced like that. Thus the effect of a reflection combined with any translation is a glide reflection, with as special case just a reflection. These are the two kinds of indirect isometries in 2D. For example, there is an isometry consisting of the reflection on the x-axis, followed by translation of one unit parallel to it. In coordinates, it takes

(x, y) to (x + 1, y).

It fixes a system of parallel lines. The isometry group generated by just a glide reflection is an infinite cyclic group. Combining two equal glide reflections gives a pure translation with a translation vector that is twice that of the glide reflection, so the even powers of the glide reflection form a translation group. In the case of glide reflection symmetry, the symmetry group of an object contains a glide reflection, and hence the group generated by it. If that is all it contains, this type is frieze group nr. 2. Example pattern with this symmetry group:
+ +++ +++ + + +++

Frieze group nr. 6 (glide-reflections, translations and rotations) is generated by a glide reflection and a rotation about a point on the line of reflection. It is isomorphic to a semi-direct product of Z and C2. Example pattern with this symmetry group:
+ + + + + + + + +