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Oblate Spheroid
A "squashed" spheroid for which the equatorial radius
is greater than the polar radius , so (called an
oblate ellipsoid by Tietze 1965, p. 27). An oblate spheroid
is a surface of revolution obtained
by rotating an ellipse about its
minor axis (Hilbert and Cohn-
Vossen 1999, p. 10). To first
approximation, the shape assumed
by a rotating fluid (including the
Earth, which is "fluid" over
astronomical time scales) is an
oblate spheroid.

For a spheroid with z-axis as the

symmetry axis, the Cartesian
equation is

(1)

The ellipticity of an oblate spheroid is defined by

(2)

The surface area of an oblate spheroid can be computed as asurface of

revolution about the z-axis,

(3)

with radius as a function of given by

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 (4)

Therefore

(5)

(6)

(7)

(8)

where the last step makes use of the logarithm identity

(9)

valid for . Re-expressing in terms of the ellipticity then gives

(10)

yielding the particular simple form

(11)

(Beyer 1987, p. 131). Another equivalent form is given by

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 (12)

The surface area can also be computed directly from the coefficients of the first
fundamental form as

(13)

(14)

Note that this is the conventional form in which the surface area of an oblate
spheroid is written, although it is formally equivalent to the conventional form
for the prolate spheroid via the identity

(15)

where is defined by

(16)

SEE ALSO: Apple, Capsule, Darwin-de Sitter Spheroid, Ellipsoid, Ellipticity,

Flattening, Oblate Spheroidal Coordinates, Prolate Spheroid, Sphere, Spheroid,
Superegg, Superellipse REFERENCES:
Beyer, W. H. CRC Standard Mathematical Tables, 28th ed. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 1987.

Hilbert, D. and Cohn-Vossen, S. Geometry and the Imagination. New York: Chelsea, p. 10, 1999.

Tietze, H. Famous Problems of Mathematics: Solved and Unsolved Mathematics Problems from Antiquity to
Modern Times. New York: Graylock Press, p. 27, 1965.

Referenced on Wolfram|Alpha: Oblate Spheroid CITE THIS AS:

Weisstein, Eric W. "Oblate Spheroid." From MathWorld--A Wolfram Web Resource.
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/OblateSpheroid.html

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