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Focus reflections in a conic?
Point F is a focus of an ellipse. Point P is the image of F when it is reflected on a line that is tangent to the ellipse. What is the locus of P as F is reflected on all tangent lines? Give a detailed description please.
Answer the same question again for the cases of a parabola and a hyperbola.
1 Answer
- Anonymous1 decade agoFavorite Answer
Let's denote the other focus E and the point of tangency A
Since tangent line forms equal angles with lines FA and EA, all three points E,A and P lie on on one straight line. Which means that
EP = EA + AP = EA + FA
On the other hand definition of ellipse is
EA + FA = const = major axis
Therefore all points P satisfy the condition
EP = const = R = major axis
that is the answer is
A circle centered at the other focus of radius R equal to major axis of ellipse
The same is true for hyperbolas, but in case if a parobola the answer is straight line parallel to directrix, which is a circle of infinite radius so to speak anyway