tangent lines
Curves' grazing contacts
Tangent lines touch a curve at exactly one point without crossing it there.
In geometry and calculus, the tangent line represents the instantaneous direction of a curve—its slope at that precise location.
The tangent line to a circle is perpendicular to the radius at the point of contact.
The concept extends to surfaces, where tangent planes serve the same function.
- curveSmooth, angleless line
- slopeAngled terrain or steepness
- derivativeFunction's rate of change
- secantTrig ratio, 1/cos
- geometryScience of spatial relationships
calculus · touch · approximations · point · circle · graze · linearization · conic sections · rate of change · graphs · functions · mathematics · definition · rate · approach · gradient · asymptote · perpendicular
- geometryangles, circles, angle, shapes, lines
- curvescurve, arc, curves, curls, curl
- ArchimedesArchimedes screw, eureka, eureka moment, buoyancy, hydrostatics
- calculusderivatives, integral, integrals, limits, differential calculus
- drawing mistakessmudging, smearing, muddy colors
- precalculusfunctions, polynomials, trigonometry, logarithms, exponential functions
line, entangle, entangled, tangent, tangential, untangled, entangling, entangles, tangency