Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Ellipse |
EllipseNoun1. 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". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "ellipse" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1686. (references) |
Etymology: Ellipse \El*lipse"\, noun. [from Greek expression, prop., defect, the inclination of the ellipse to the base of the cone being in defect when compared with that of the side to the base: compare to the French expression ellipse. See Ellipsis.]. (Websters 1913) |
| Domain | Definitions |
Mathematics | If the eccentricity is 0, the ellipse becomes a circle; if the eccentricity is 1, the ellipse becomes a parabola. Source: European Union. (references) |
Aerospace | A plane curve constituting the locus of all points the sum of whose distances from two fixed points called focuses or foci is constant; an elongated circle. See conic section.The orbits of planets, satellites, planetoids, and comets are ellipses, the primary being at one focus. (references) |
Physics | Oval. That the orbits of the planets are ellipses, not circles, was first discovered by Johannes Kepler based on the careful observations by Tycho Brahe. (references) |
Space | A closed plane curve generated in such a way that the sums of its distances from the two fixed points (the foci) is constant. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
In mathematics, an ellipse is a figure resembling a circle which has been stretched in one direction. This is an example of a conic section and can be defined as the locus of all points, in a plane, which have the same sum of distances from two given fixed points (called foci, plural of focus). In nature, the orbits of planets (around a star) are generally elliptic.
If the two foci coincide, then the ellipse becomes a circle; such an ellipse is the roundest possible ellipse; and may arguably no longer be a "true" ellipse. The eccentricity of an ellipse is greater than zero and smaller than one.
The line which passes through the foci is the major axis and also the longest line which passes through the ellipse. The line which passes through the centre (halfway between the foci), at right angles to the major axis, is the minor axis. The semimajor axis is one half the major axis; running from the center, through a focus, and to the edge of the ellipse. Likewise, the semiminor axis is one half the minor axis. The two axes are the elliptic equivalants of the diameter, while the two semiaxes are the elliptic equivalents of the radius.
The size and shape of an ellipse are determined by two constants, conventionally denoted a and b. The constant a equals the length of the semimajor axis; The constant b equals the length of the semiminor axis.
An ellipse centred at the origin of an x-y coordinate system with its major axis along the x-axis is defined by the equation
The shape of an ellipse is usually expressed by a number called the eccentricity of the ellipse, conventionally denoted e (not to be confused with the mathematical constant e). The eccentricity is related to a and b by the statement
The semi-latus rectum of an ellipse, usually denoted l (a lowercase L), is the distance from a focus of the ellipse to the ellipse itself, measured along a line perpendicular to the major axis. It is related to a and b by the formula al = b2.
In polar coordinates, an ellipse with one focus at the origin and the other on the negative x-axis is given by the equation
The area enclosed by an ellipse is πab, where π is Archimedes' constant. The circumference of an ellipse is 4aE(e), where the function E is the complete elliptic integral of the second kind.
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Ellipse."
Synonym: EllipseSynonym: oval (n). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Circularity | Ellipse, oval, ovule; ellipsoid, cycloid; epicycloid, epicycle; semicircle; quadrant, sextant, sector. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
| Domain | Title | ||
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High Tech |
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Consumer Goods | |||
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | A diagram showing the various angles of cut of a cone required to produce a parabola, hyperbola, and ellipse. In: "Geometriae practicae novae et auctae tractatus I[-IV] ..." by Schwenter, Daniel, 1585-1636. Vol. I, page 14. Published posthumously in 1641.Credit: Treasures of the Library. |  | View looking to the eastward from the front of the then-new Navy Department Building, with the Pan American Union building to the left and the Ellipse in the center, 1919. Ramps on the building at far left were used to facilitate removal of victims of the Spanish influenza. The structure was a temporary office building converted to a hospital. Note the presence of a few horse-drawn vehicles amid the many automobiles.Credit: NAVY. |
 | Flood of August 23, 1933. Washington Monument from south Ellipse.Credit: Library of Congress. | ||
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Author | Quotation |
Victor Hugo | Mankind is not a circle with a single center but an ellipse with two focal points of which facts are one and ideas the other. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | |
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | This should entail removal of an ellipse or core of full-thickness of skin and subcutaneous tissue at the most raised and irregular site, or, if this is not apparent, at an area of dark pigmentation. (references) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Ellipse" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 97.30% of the time. "Ellipse" is used about 74 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 97.3% | 72 | 39,377 |
| Noun (proper) | 2.7% | 2 | 245,945 |
| Total | 100.00% | 74 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expression using "ellipse": elongated ellipse. Additional references. | |
| Hypenated Usage | |
Ending with "ellipse": half-ellipse. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
ellipse | 107 |
ellipse equation | 30 |
area ellipse | 27 |
draw ellipse | 17 |
drawing ellipse | 13 |
louis vuitton ellipse | 13 |
circumference ellipse | 10 |
ellipse formula | 9 |
calculator ellipse | 6 |
nordic track ellipse | 6 |
ellipse ontharing | 6 |
eccentricity ellipse | 5 |
ellipse focus | 5 |
ellipse macadam | 5 |
ellipse volume | 4 |
ellipse template | 4 |
ellipse math | 4 |
ellipse vuitton | 4 |
ellipse grill | 4 |
ellipse geometry | 4 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "ellipse"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Albanian | elips, shenja që tregojn heqjen e tekstit (ellipsis), gjë me formë vezake. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Arabic | القطع الناقص. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bulgarian | овал (oval), елипса (ellipsis). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Chinese | 橢" (elliptical; oval), 橢 , 椭圆 (Ellipses, Elliptic). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Czech | elipsa (ellipsis). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Danish | ellipse (ellipsis). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Dutch | ellips. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Farsi | حذف (Deletion, Elimination, Omission), تخم مرغی (Oval), ادغام (Contraction, Diphthong, Merger, Umlaut), شلجمی (Dome, Parabola). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Finnish | ellipsi, soikio (oval). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
French | ellipse (ellipsis). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
German | ellipse (ellipsis). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Greek | έλλειψη (absence, dearth, default of, defect, deficiency, ellipsis, failing, lack, scarcity, shortage, shortage of, shortcoming, starving, want). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hebrew | אליפס". (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hungarian | ellipszis. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Indonesian | elips, bulat panjang. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Italian | ellisse (omission). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Japanese Kanji | 長円 (oval), 楕円 . (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Japanese Katakana | ちょうえ" (enteritis, oval), え". (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Korean | 타원 (Ellipses, Elliptic). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Manx | eelips. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pig Latin | ellipseay elipse (ellipsis, elliptic), vara (arm, baton, beam, boom, cane, coppice shoot, fish rod, fruit cane, herd, pole, post, rod, sap shoot, sprout, staff, stake, stalk, stick, stool shoot, sucker, switch, wand, water shoot, wattle). (various references) elipsã (ellipsis). (various references) эллипс. (various references) elipsa (ellipsis). (various references) elipse. (various references) ellips (ellipsis). (various references) รูปวงรี. (various references) elips, eksilti (ellipsis), eksik fakat anlaşılır tümce kullanma (ellipsis). (various references) овал (balloon, oval), еліпс. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Greek | 700 BCE-300 CE | elleipsis. (various references) |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | ellipsis. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "ellipse": ellipses. (additional references) | |
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"Ellipse" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: ecllipse, elips, elipse, elipso, elipsot, ellipase, ellips, ellipso, ellis, ellise, ellispe. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "ellipse" (pronounced uli"ps) |
| 4 | -l i" p s | blips, clips, eclipse, flips, lips, slips. |
| 3 | -i" p s | chips, dips, drips, equips, grips, hips, microchips, outstrips, pips, quips, rips, ships, sips, skips, snips, strips, thrips, tips, trips, whips, zips. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "e-e-i-l-l-p-s" | |
-2 letters: lisle, peels, peise, peles, piles, pills, plies, selle, sleep, slipe, speel, speil, spell, spiel, spile, spill. | |
-3 letters: eels, ells, else, ills, isle, lees, leis, lies, lipe, lips, lisp, peel, pees, pele, pies, pile, pill, plie, seel, seep, sell, sill, sipe, slip. | |
-4 letters: eel, ell, els, ill, lee, lei, lie, lip, lis, pee, pes, pie, pis, psi, see, sei, sel, sip. | |
-5 letters: el, es, is, li, pe, pi, si. | |
| Words containing the letters "e-e-i-l-l-p-s" | |
+1 letter: ellipses, pileless, sleepily, spinelle. | |
+2 letters: callipees, dispelled, eolipiles, eolopiles, impellers, millepeds, palletise, pelletise, pellicles, sleeplike, spinelles. | |
+3 letters: espadrille, especially, millipedes, misspelled, paillettes, palletised, palletises, palletizes, pelletised, pelletises, pelletizes, petiolules, pointelles, potbellies, preselling, respelling. | |
+4 letters: coleoptiles, espadrilles, explosively, lepidolites, multiplexes, palletizers, pelletising, pelletizers, pellitories, permillages, pestilently, philatelies, pliableness, pollenizers, prelusively, pricelessly, repulsively, respellings, spellbinder, spinelessly, spirituelle, spitefuller. | |
+5 letters: appellatives, boilerplates, despitefully, displaceable, equipollents, fellowshiped, glockenspiel, milliamperes, multiplexers, nucleophiles, pallidnesses, peccadilloes, pedestalling, pestilential, philhellenes, phlebologies, planetesimal, preclusively, repellencies, septennially, sleepwalking, speedballing, speleologies, speleologist, spellbinders, spitefullest, superhelical. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)45 6C 6C 69 70 73 65 |
| Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)
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| American Sign Language (origins from 1620-1817 in Italy and, especially, France) (references)
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| Semaphore (1791, in France) (references)
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| Braille (1829, in France) (references)
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Morse Code (1836) (references). .-.. .-.. .. .--. ... . |
| Dancing Men (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1903) (references)
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Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)01000101 01101100 01101100 01101001 01110000 01110011 01100101 |
HTML Code (1990) (references)E l l i p s e |
ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)0045 006C 006C 0069 0070 0073 0065 |
| British Sign Language (Fingerspelling, BSL; 1992, British Deaf Association Dictionary of British Sign Language) (references)
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Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)39787875828571 |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Commercial | 5. Images: Slideshow 6. Images: Photo Album 7. Quotations: Familiar 8. Quotations: Non-fiction | 9. Usage Frequency 10. Expressions 11. Expressions: Internet 12. Translations: Modern | 13. Translations: Ancient 14. Derivations 15. Rhymes 16. Anagrams | 17. Orthography 18. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
