Geometric Model, L. Brill No. 63. Ser. 10 No. 5, Cyclide (Parabolic Ring Cyclide)
date: label: date made
content: 1892
name: label: maker
content: L. Brill
notes: label: Description
content: As an undergraduate at the École polytechnique in Paris, French naval engineer and mathematician Charles Dupin (1784-1873) described a set of surfaces based on inversions of the torus – surfaces that came to be called Dupin cyclides. All the lines of curvature on such surfaces are circles or straight lines. Dupin published a description of cyclides in 1822. Between 1879 and 1885, Alexander Brill and his students and colleagues would publish several different models of Dupin cyclides. This is one of them, sold by the German firm of Ludwig Brill from 1885. It was exhibited at the Columbia Exposition held in Chicago in 1893 and then acquired by Wesleyan University.
label: Description
content: This white plaster model is of a parabolic cyclide. It has a round opening in the center and flat sides on the right and left. Various circular arcs indicate lines of curvature. A paper tag reads: 63.
label: Description
content: This is one of four models of cyclides designed by Sebastian Finsterwalder (1862-1951), an applied mathematician who would be on the faculty in Munich for many years.
label: Description
content: References:
label: Description
content: L. Brill, <I>Catalog mathematischer Modelle. . .</I>, Darmstadt: L. Brill,1892, p. 21, 66.
label: Description
content: G. Fischer, <I>Mathematical Models: Commentary</I>, Braunschweig / Wiesbaden: Friedr. Vieweg & Sohn, 1986, pp. 28-30.
label: Description
content: Ulf Hashagen, “ Die Mathematik und ihre Assistenten an der TH Munchen (1868-1918), <I>Mathematics and Theoretical Physics</I>, <I>Symposia Gaussiana</I>, ed. M. Behara, R. Fritsch, and R.G. Lintz, 1995, pp. 140-144.
label: Description
content: D. Hilbert and S. Cohn-Vossen, <I>Geometry and the Imagination</I>, New York: Chelsea, 1952, pp. 217-219.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: Germany: Hesse, Darmstadt
topic: label: Subject
content: Mathematics
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Mathematics
label: See more items in
content: Science & Mathematics
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Wesleyan University
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1985.0112.048
label: catalog number
content: 1985.0112.048
label: accession number
content: 1985.0112
objectType: label: Object Name
content: geometric model
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: plaster (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: paper (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 12 cm x 17.5 cm x 15.7 cm; 4 23/32 in x 6 7/8 in x 6 3/16 in