What is hyperbola:We have already stated that a conic section is a hyperbola if you can check. Let
and
be a fixed point and
be a line not containing
. Also let
be a point in the plane and
be the perpendicular distance of
from
.
The set of all points such that
is called a hyperbola. and
are respectively focus and directrix of the hyperbola
is the eccentricity.
Standard Equation of Hyperbola
Let be the focus with
and
be the directrix of the hyperbola.
Also, let be a point on the hyperbola, then by definition
.
.
.
.
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or
.
.
.
.
.
let us set , so that
become
.
.
.
.
.
where .
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is standard equation of Hyperbola
It is clear that the curve is symmetric with respect to both axes. If we take the point as focus and the line
as directrix, then it is easy to see that the set of all points
such that
is a hyperbola with as its equation.
Thus a hyperbola has two foci and two directrices.
If the foci lie on the , then roles of
and
are interchanged in (3) and the equation
of the hyperbola becomes
.
Definition: The hyperbola .
meets the x-axis at points with and
. The points
and
are called vertices of the hyperbola. The line segment
is called the transverse (or focal) axis of the hyperbola
. The equation
does not meet the y-axis in real points. However the line segment joining the points B(0, -b) and B’(0, b) is called the conjugate axis of the hyperbola. The midpoint
of
is called the centre of the hyperbola.
In the case of hyperbole (3), we have
. The eccentricity
so that, unlike the ellipse, we may have or
or
The point lies on the hyperbola
for all real values of
. The equations
are called parametric equations of the hyperbola.
Since
when
The lines (2) do not meet the curve but the distance of any point on the curve from any of the two lines approaches zero. Such lines are called asymptotes of a curve. The joint equation of the asymptotes of (3) is obtained by writing 0 instead of 1 on the right-hand side of the standard form (3). Asymptotes are very helpful in graphing a hyperbola. The ellipse and hyperbola are called central conics because each has a center of symmetry.