Concept

Minkowski plane

In mathematics, a Minkowski plane (named after Hermann Minkowski) is one of the Benz planes (the others being Möbius plane and Laguerre plane). Applying the pseudo-euclidean distance on two points (instead of the euclidean distance) we get the geometry of hyperbolas, because a pseudo-euclidean circle is a hyperbola with midpoint . By a transformation of coordinates , , the pseudo-euclidean distance can be rewritten as . The hyperbolas then have asymptotes parallel to the non-primed coordinate axes. The following completion (see Möbius and Laguerre planes) homogenizes the geometry of hyperbolas: the set of points: the set of cycles The incidence structure is called the classical real Minkowski plane. The set of points consists of , two copies of and the point . Any line is completed by point , any hyperbola by the two points (see figure). Two points can not be connected by a cycle if and only if or . We define: Two points are (+)-parallel () if and (−)-parallel () if . Both these relations are equivalence relations on the set of points. Two points are called parallel () if or . From the definition above we find: Lemma: For any pair of non parallel points there is exactly one point with . For any point and any cycle there are exactly two points with . For any three points , , , pairwise non parallel, there is exactly one cycle that contains . For any cycle , any point and any point and there exists exactly one cycle such that , i.e. touches at point P. Like the classical Möbius and Laguerre planes Minkowski planes can be described as the geometry of plane sections of a suitable quadric. But in this case the quadric lives in projective 3-space: The classical real Minkowski plane is isomorphic to the geometry of plane sections of a hyperboloid of one sheet (not degenerated quadric of index 2). Let be an incidence structure with the set of points, the set of cycles and two equivalence relations ((+)-parallel) and ((−)-parallel) on set . For we define: and . An equivalence class or is called (+)-generator and (−)-generator, respectively.

About this result
This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.

Graph Chatbot

Chat with Graph Search

Ask any question about EPFL courses, lectures, exercises, research, news, etc. or try the example questions below.

DISCLAIMER: The Graph Chatbot is not programmed to provide explicit or categorical answers to your questions. Rather, it transforms your questions into API requests that are distributed across the various IT services officially administered by EPFL. Its purpose is solely to collect and recommend relevant references to content that you can explore to help you answer your questions.