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Concept
Boy's surface
Summary
In geometry, Boy's surface is an immersion of the real projective plane in 3-dimensional space found by Werner Boy in 1901. He discovered it on assignment from David Hilbert to prove that the projective plane could not be immersed in 3-space.
Boy's surface was first parametrized explicitly by Bernard Morin in 1978. Another parametrization was discovered by Rob Kusner and Robert Bryant. Boy's surface is one of the two possible immersions of the real projective plane which have only a single triple point.
Unlike the Roman surface and the cross-cap, it has no other singularities than self-intersections (that is, it has no pinch-points).
Boy's surface can be parametrized in several ways. One parametrization, discovered by Rob Kusner and Robert Bryant, is the following: given a complex number w whose magnitude is less than or equal to one (), let
and then set
we then obtain the Cartesian coordinates x, y, and z of a point on the Boy's surface.
If one performs an inversion of this parametrization centered on the triple point, one obtains a complete minimal surface with three ends (that's how this parametrization was discovered naturally). This implies that the Bryant–Kusner parametrization of Boy's surfaces is "optimal" in the sense that it is the "least bent" immersion of a projective plane into three-space.
If w is replaced by the negative reciprocal of its complex conjugate, then the functions g1, g2, and g3 of w are left unchanged.
By replacing w in terms of its real and imaginary parts w = s + it, and expanding resulting parameterization, one may obtain a parameterization of Boy's surface in terms of rational functions of s and t. This shows that Boy's surface is not only an algebraic surface, but even a rational surface. The remark of the preceding paragraph shows that the generic fiber of this parameterization consists of two points (that is that almost every point of Boy's surface may be obtained by two parameters values).
Let be the Bryant–Kusner parametrization of Boy's surface.
Official source
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