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In geometry, a tetrahedron (pl.: tetrahedra or tetrahedrons), also known as a triangular pyramid, is a polyhedron composed of four triangular faces, six straight edges, and four vertices. The tetrahedron is the simplest of all the ordinary convex polyhedra .
In geometry, a Platonic solid is a convex, regular polyhedron in three-dimensional Euclidean space.Being a regular polyhedron means that the faces are congruent (identical in shape and size) regular polygons (all angles congruent and all edges congruent), and the same number of faces meet at each vertex.
Examples include Circoporus octahedrus, Circogonia icosahedra, Lithocubus geometricus and Circorrhegma dodecahedra; the shapes of these creatures are indicated by their names. [5] The outer protein shells of many viruses form regular polyhedra. For example, HIV is enclosed in a regular icosahedron, as is the head of a typical myovirus. [6] [7]
If the legs have lengths a, b, c, then the trirectangular tetrahedron has the volume [2] =. The altitude h satisfies [3] = + +. The area of the base is given by [4] =. The solid angle at the right-angled vertex, from which the opposite face (the base) subtends an octant, has measure π /2 steradians, one eighth of the surface area of a unit sphere.
A regular tetrahedron, an example of a solid with full tetrahedral symmetry. A regular tetrahedron has 12 rotational (or orientation-preserving) symmetries, and a symmetry order of 24 including transformations that combine a reflection and a rotation.
If two regular tetrahedra are given the same orientation on the 3-fold axis, a different compound is made, with D 3h, [3,2] symmetry, order 12.. Other orientations can be chosen as 2 tetrahedra within the compound of five tetrahedra and compound of ten tetrahedra the latter of which can be seen as a hexagrammic pyramid:
The triakis truncated tetrahedron is a polyhedron constructed from a truncated tetrahedron by adding three tetrahedrons onto its triangular faces, as interpreted by the name "triakis". It is classified as plesiohedron , meaning it can tessellate in three-dimensional space known as honeycomb ; an example is triakis truncated tetrahedral honeycomb .
Tetrahedral numbers can be modelled by stacking spheres. For example, the fifth tetrahedral number (Te 5 = 35) can be modelled with 35 billiard balls and the standard triangular billiards ball frame that holds 15 balls in place. Then 10 more balls are stacked on top of those, then another 6, then another three and one ball at the top completes ...