Angles In Circles

Arc length

A good way to think about arcs is the definition of a radian. If you take the radius of a circle and make it an arc length on the side of the circle, the resulting angle is one radian.

An arc length is always given by s = ršœ­ where s is the length and r is the radius. šœ­ must be in radians for this equation.

Circular sector

The circular sector is the area inside an angle defining an arc length.

It can be calculated with A = 1/2r^2šœ­

Trig functions of real numbers

When you see sint or sins it indicates a trig function being evaluated on a real number, not an angle

These can be called circular functions.

The real number is treated as if it is a radian

For example: Angular velocity w = šœ­/t

w = pi/2 / 10 = pi/20 rad/s