The shape of a soccer ball may be described as a "truncated
icosahedron":
"The truncated icosahedron is the shape used in the construction of
soccer balls: the pattern on the surface of a soccer ball consists of
12 identical black pentagons and 20 identical white hexagons."
Science U: The Truncated Icosahedron
http://www.scienceu.com/geometry/facts/solids/tr_icosa.html
"To me, 'soccer ball' means one particular polyhedron, the truncated
icosahedron, which is the basis for the stitching pattern on a real
soccerball."
The Math Forum: Ask Dr. Math
http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/55127.html
"Take a solid such as a soccer ball, (truncated icosahedron) there are
both regular hexagons and pentagons used to enclose this three
dimensional space."
University of Limerick: Platonic Solids
http://www.ul.ie/~cahird/polyhedronmode/photo.htm
Other descriptions that apply are "spherical Buckyball" or "geodesic
sphere":
"A Buckyball is a polyhedron with two properties: (1) every face is
either a pentagon or a hexagon and (2) each vertex has degree 3... A
Buckyball is called a spherical Buckyball if its 12 pentagon faces are
evenly-spaced on the surface of the Buckyball.
That definition might not seem very rigorous, but it'll do for now.
Spherical Buckyballs are also known as geodesic spheres or geodesic
domes. The Epcot Center dome, for example, is a spherical Buckyball.
So is the soccer ball."
http://www.merrimack.edu/~thull/combgeom/bucky/buckynotes.html
"The buckyball; the molecular soccer ball of the future. Discovered 17
years ago, this wonder is stirring up the worlds of physics and
chemistry... The buckminsterfullerene, or buckyball as it is more
commonly known, is a perfect geodesic sphere, like a molecular soccer
ball."
Colorado Engineer Magazine: A Little Bit of Bucky
http://cem.colorado.edu/archives/su2002/bucky.html
My Google search strategy:
Google Web Search: "truncated icosahedron" + "soccer ball"
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22truncated+icosahedron%22+%22soccer+ball
Google Web Search: "spherical buckyball" + "soccer ball"
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22spherical+buckyball%22+%22soccer+ball
Google Web Search: "geodesic sphere" + "soccer ball"
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22geodesic+sphere%22+%22soccer+ball
I hope this information is helpful. If anything is unclear, or if a
link does not function, please request clarification; I'll be glad to
offer further assistance before you rate my answer.
Best regards,
pinkfreud |
