Parabolas and other curvy shapes for beaders

I love the curvy parabolic shapes that form my latest bracelet (see photo) – they seem pleasing and fascinating all at once. http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=43294070

I also love the word - parabola - what a wonderful word to roll around the tongue. It comes from the world of mathematics. Apparently, parabolas are sections of cones. As with many things mathematical parabolas appear in daily life in lots of places. For instance, when you shine a torch on a wall you see a parabolic curve of light appear, they occur in supporting arches and in their suspension ropes of bridges (e.g. the Golden Gate bridge in San Fransciso) and even in Smiley faces. (see photos).

The bounce of a ball creates parabolic shapes and there is even a poem that features the parabola - The Parabolic Balad by the Russian poet, Andrei Voznesensky. His poem begins:

‘My life, like a rocket, makes a parabola
flying in darkness, -- no rainbow for traveler’
(See famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/andrei.../poems/22223 for the complete poem).

Apparently, apart from winning the USSR State Prize for poetry Voznesenshy has a minor planet (3723) Voznesenskij, named after him.

Mathematics is full of wonderful language to describe a huge variety of curves in our daily life. A great way to expand your curvy language is to visit the online National Curve Bank: A Collection of Famous Plane Curves created in Mathematic by Gusavo Gordillo.

• http://curvebank.calstatela.edu/famouscurves/famous.htm#Index

Here is a peak at just some of the delectable language of curves that I found in the National Curve Bank that could help you name your beaded curves or inspire you to create curves galore in your beading. Watch this space for more curvy delights in my own beading.

1. Astroid
2. Pear-shaped Quartic
3. Bicorn
4. Folium of Descartes
5. Plateau Curves
6. Cardiod
7. Freeth's Nephroid
8. Pursuit Curve
9. Cartesian Oval
10. Quadratrix of Hippias
11. Catenary
12. Hyperbola
13. Rhodonea Curves
14. Cayley's Sextic
15. Hyperbolic Spiral
16. Right Strophoid
17. Cissoid of Diocles
18. Hypotrochoid
19. Sinusoidal Spirals
20. Cochleoid
21. Involute of a Circle
22. Spiral of Archimedes
23. Conchoid
24. Kampyle of Eudoxus
25. Spiric Sections
26. Conchoid of de Sluze
27. Kappa Curve
28. Straight Line
29. Cycloid
30. Lamé Curves
31. Talbot's Curve
32. Devil's Curve
33. Lemniscate of Bernoulli
34. Tractrix
35. Double Folium
36. Limacon of Pascal
37. Tricuspoid
38. Dürer's Shell Curves
39. Lissajous Curves
40. Trident of Newton
41. Eight Curve
42. Lituus
43. Trifolium
44. Epicycloid
45. Nephroid
46. Tschirnhaus' Cubic

Sources

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrey_Voznesensky