snub cube

{{Short description|Archimedean solid with 38 faces}}

{{infobox polyhedron

| name = Snub cube

| image = 130px130px

| caption = Two different forms of a snub cube

| type = Archimedean solid

| faces = 38

| edges = 60

| vertices = 24

| symmetry = Rotational octahedral symmetry \mathrm{O}

| angle = triangle-to-triangle: 153.23°
triangle-to-square: 142.98°

| dual = Pentagonal icositetrahedron

| properties = convex, chiral

| vertex_figure = Polyhedron snub 6-8 left vertfig.svg

| net = Polyhedron snub 6-8 left net.svg

}}

In geometry, the snub cube, or snub cuboctahedron, is an Archimedean solid with 38 faces: 6 squares and 32 equilateral triangles. It has 60 edges and 24 vertices. Kepler first named it in Latin as cubus simus in 1619 in his Harmonices Mundi.{{r|cbg}} H. S. M. Coxeter, noting it could be derived equally from the octahedron as the cube, called it snub cuboctahedron, with a vertical extended Schläfli symbol s \scriptstyle\begin{Bmatrix} 4 \\ 3 \end{Bmatrix}, and representing an alternation of a truncated cuboctahedron, which has Schläfli symbol t \scriptstyle\begin{Bmatrix} 4 \\ 3 \end{Bmatrix}.

Construction

The snub cube can be generated by taking the six faces of the cube, pulling them outward so they no longer touch, then giving them each a small rotation on their centers (all clockwise or all counter-clockwise) until the spaces between can be filled with equilateral triangles.{{r|holme}}

File:A5-A7.gif

The snub cube may also be constructed from a rhombicuboctahedron. It started by twisting its square face (in blue), allowing its triangles (in red) to be automatically twisted in opposite directions, forming other square faces (in white) to be skewed quadrilaterals that can be filled in two equilateral triangles.{{sfnp|Conway|Burgiel|Goodman-Struss|2008|p=287–288}}

The snub cube can also be derived from the truncated cuboctahedron by the process of alternation. 24 vertices of the truncated cuboctahedron form a polyhedron topologically equivalent to the snub cube; the other 24 form its mirror-image. The resulting polyhedron is vertex-transitive but not uniform.

{{multiple image

| align = center | total_width = 450

| image1 = Polyhedron great rhombi 6-8 subsolid snub left maxmatch.png

| image2 = Polyhedron great rhombi 6-8 max.png

| image3 = Polyhedron great rhombi 6-8 subsolid snub right maxmatch.png

| footer = Uniform alternation of a truncated cuboctahedron

}}

= Cartesian coordinates =

Cartesian coordinates for the vertices of a snub cube are all the even permutations of

\left(\pm 1, \pm \frac{1}{t}, \pm t \right),

with an even number of plus signs, along with all the odd permutations with an odd number of plus signs, where t \approx 1.83929 is the tribonacci constant.{{r|collins}} Taking the even permutations with an odd number of plus signs, and the odd permutations with an even number of plus signs, gives a different snub cube, the mirror image. Taking them together yields the compound of two snub cubes.

This snub cube has edges of length \alpha = \sqrt{2+4t-2t^2}, a number which satisfies the equation

\alpha^6-4\alpha^4+16\alpha^2-32=0,

and can be written as

\begin{align} \alpha &= \sqrt{\frac{4}{3}-\frac{16}{3\beta}+\frac{2\beta}{3}}\approx1.609\,72 \\ \beta &= \sqrt[3]{26+6\sqrt{33}}. \end{align}

To get a snub cube with unit edge length, divide all the coordinates above by the value α given above.

Properties

File:Snub cube.stl

For a snub cube with edge length a, its surface area and volume are:{{r|berman}}

\begin{align}

A &= \left(6+8\sqrt{3}\right)a^2 &\approx 19.856a^2 \\

V &= \frac{8t+6}{3\sqrt{2(t^2-3)}}a^3 &\approx 7.889a^3.

\end{align}

The snub cube is an Archimedean solid, meaning it is a highly symmetric and semi-regular polyhedron, and two or more different regular polygonal faces meet in a vertex.{{r|diudea}} It is chiral, meaning there are two distinct forms whenever being mirrored. Therefore, the snub cube has the rotational octahedral symmetry \mathrm{O} .{{r|kocakoca|cromwell}} The polygonal faces that meet for every vertex are four equilateral triangles and one square, and the vertex figure of a snub cube is 3^4 \cdot 4 . The dual polyhedron of a snub cube is pentagonal icositetrahedron, a Catalan solid.{{r|williams}}

Graph

File:Snub cubic graph.png

The skeleton of a snub cube can be represented as a graph with 24 vertices and 60 edges, an Archimedean graph.{{citation|last1=Read|first1=R. C.|last2=Wilson|first2=R. J.|title=An Atlas of Graphs|publisher=Oxford University Press|year= 1998|page=269}}

References

{{reflist|refs=

{{cite journal

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| year = 1971

| title = Regular-faced convex polyhedra

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| issue = 5

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| doi = 10.1016/0016-0032(71)90071-8

| mr = 290245

}}

{{cite book

| last1 = Conway | first1 = John H.

| last2 = Burgiel | first2 = Heidi

| last3 = Goodman-Struss | first3 = Chaim

| year = 2008

| title = The Symmetries of Things

| page = 287

| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Drj1CwAAQBAJ&pg=PA287

| publisher = CRC Press

| isbn = 978-1-4398-6489-0

}}

{{cite book

| last = Collins | first = Julian

| year = 2019

| title = Numbers in Minutes

| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=azKKDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA96

| page = 36–37

| publisher = Hachette

| isbn = 978-1-78747-730-8

}}

{{cite book

| last = Cromwell | first = Peter R.

| title = Polyhedra

| year = 1997

| url = https://archive.org/details/polyhedra0000crom/page/386/mode/1up

| publisher = Cambridge University Press

| isbn = 978-0-521-55432-9

| page = 386

}}

{{cite book

| last = Diudea | first = M. V.

| year = 2018

| title = Multi-shell Polyhedral Clusters

| series = Carbon Materials: Chemistry and Physics

| volume = 10

| publisher = Springer

| isbn = 978-3-319-64123-2

| doi = 10.1007/978-3-319-64123-2

| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=p_06DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA39

| page = 39

}}

{{cite book

| last = Holme | first = A.

| year = 2010

| title = Geometry: Our Cultural Heritage

| publisher = Springer

| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=zXwQGo8jyHUC

| isbn = 978-3-642-14441-7

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{{cite book

| last1 = Koca | first1 = M.

| last2 = Koca | first2 = N. O.

| year = 2013

| title = Mathematical Physics: Proceedings of the 13th Regional Conference, Antalya, Turkey, 27–31 October 2010

| contribution = Coxeter groups, quaternions, symmetries of polyhedra and 4D polytopes

| contribution-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=ILnBkuSxXGEC&pg=PA49

| page = 49

| publisher = World Scientific

}}

{{cite book

| last = Williams | first = Robert | authorlink = Robert Williams (geometer)

| year = 1979

| title = The Geometrical Foundation of Natural Structure: A Source Book of Design

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| isbn = 978-0-486-23729-9 | url = https://archive.org/details/geometricalfound00will

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}}

  • {{cite journal |last=Jayatilake |first=Udaya |title=Calculations on face and vertex regular polyhedra |journal=Mathematical Gazette |date=March 2005 |volume=89 |issue=514 |pages=76–81|doi=10.1017/S0025557200176818 |s2cid=125675814 }}
  • {{The Geometrical Foundation of Natural Structure (book)}} (Section 3-9)