Download or read book Differential Geometry of Plane Curves written by Hilário Alencar and published by American Mathematical Society. This book was released on 2022-04-27 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book features plane curves—the simplest objects in differential geometry—to illustrate many deep and inspiring results in the field in an elementary and accessible way. After an introduction to the basic properties of plane curves, the authors introduce a number of complex and beautiful topics, including the rotation number (with a proof of the fundamental theorem of algebra), rotation index, Jordan curve theorem, isoperimetric inequality, convex curves, curves of constant width, and the four-vertex theorem. The last chapter connects the classical with the modern by giving an introduction to the curve-shortening flow that is based on original articles but requires a minimum of previous knowledge. Over 200 figures and more than 100 exercises illustrate the beauty of plane curves and test the reader's skills. Prerequisites are courses in standard one variable calculus and analytic geometry on the plane.