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Big Ideas Math Geometry, 2014

BI

Big Ideas Math Geometry, 2014 View details

Quiz

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Exercise 6 Page 552

A tangent is a line that intersects a circle in exactly one point.

Example Solution: QR

Practice makes perfect

Before naming a tangent from the graph, let's review some important definitions about circles.

Radius: A segment whose endpoints are the center and any point on the circumference on a circle.
Chord: A segment whose endpoints are on the circumference of a circle.
Diameter: A chord that contains the center of the circle.
Secant: A line that intersects a circle in two points.
Tangent: A line in the plane of a circle that intersects the circle in exactly one point — the point of tangency.

Now, consider the given diagram. We can see that QR intersects the circle in exactly one point.

Therefore, according to the definitions, QR is a tangent to the circle. Note that this is only one of the many names this line can take.