We use cookies to enhance your experience on our website. By continuing to use our website, you are agreeing to our use of cookies. You can change your cookie settings at any time.ContinueFind out more
A symmetrical open plane curve formed by the intersection of a cone with a plane parallel to its side. The path of a projectile under the influence of gravity follows a curve of this shape.
‘There are three non-degenerate conics: the ellipse, the parabola, and the hyperbola.’
‘The solutions to the equations describing the motions produced by this law are called conic sections - ellipses, hyperbolae and parabolae - which you get by intersecting a plane and a cone.’
‘Menaechmus is famed for his discovery of the conic sections and he was the first to show that ellipses, parabolas, and hyperbolas are obtained by cutting a cone in a plane not parallel to the base.’
‘Newton and Kepler left behind the tools for constructing flight paths from simple conic sections - bits of parabolas, hyperbolas, ellipses, and the ubiquitous circle - and their use is now a highly developed art.’
‘Long-period comets can have orbits ranging from eccentric ellipses to parabolas to even modest hyperbolas.’
Origin
Late 16th century: modern Latin, from Greek parabolē ‘placing side by side, application’, from para- ‘beside’ + bolē ‘a throw’ (from the verb ballein).