Cube | Geometry - Encyclopedia Britannica

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• Story of Mathematics - Cube|Definition & Meaning
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cube, in Euclidean geometry, a regular solid with six square faces; that is, a regular hexahedron.

Since the volume of a cube is expressed, in terms of an edge e, as e3, in arithmetic and algebra the third power of a quantity is called the cube of that quantity. That is, 33, or 27, is the cube of 3, and x3 is the cube of x. A number of which a given number is the cube is called the cube root of the latter number; that is, since 27 is the cube of 3, 3 is the cube root of 27—symbolically, 3 = 3Square root of√27. A number that is not a cube is also said to have a cube root, the value being expressed approximately; that is, 4 is not a cube, but the cube root of 4 is expressed as 3Square root of√4, the approximate value being 1.587.

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In Greek geometry the duplication of the cube was one of the most famous of the unsolved problems. It required the construction of a cube that should have twice the volume of a given cube. This proved to be impossible by the aid of the straight edge and compasses alone, but the Greeks were able to effect the construction by the use of higher curves, notably by the cissoid of Diocles. Hippocrates showed that the problem reduced to that of finding two mean proportionals between a line segment and its double—that is, algebraically, to that of finding x and y in the proportion a:x = x:y = y:2a, from which x3 = 2a3, and hence the cube with x as an edge has twice the volume of one with a as an edge.

Britannica Quiz Define It: Math Terms This article was most recently revised and updated by Michael Ray.