In geometry, the bilunabirotunda is a Johnson solid with faces of 8 equilateral triangles, 2 squares, and 4 regular pentagons.
Properties
The bilunabirotunda is named from the prefix lune, meaning a figure featuring two triangles adjacent to opposite sides of a square. Therefore, the faces of a bilunabirotunda possess 8 equilateral triangles, 2 squares, and 4 regular pentagons as it faces.[1] It is one of the Johnson solids—a convex polyhedron in which all of the faces are regular polygon—enumerated as 91st Johnson solid .[2] It is known as the elementary polyhedron, meaning that it cannot be separated by a plane into two small regular-faced polyhedra.[3]
The surface area of a bilunabirotunda with edge length is:[1]
and the volume of a bilunabirotunda is:[1]
Cartesian coordinates
One way to construct a bilunabirotunda with edge length is by union of the orbits of the coordinates
under the group's action (of order 8) generated by reflections about coordinate planes.[4]
Applications
Reynolds (2004) discusses the bilunabirotunda as a shape that could be used in architecture.[5]
Six bilunabirotundae can be augmented around a cube with pyritohedral symmetry. B. M. Stewart labeled this six-bilunabirotunda model as 6J91(P4).[6]
Such clusters combine with regular dodecahedra to form a space-filling honeycomb.
^Timofeenko, A. V. (2009). "The Non-Platonic and Non-Archimedean Noncomposite Polyhedra". Journal of Mathematical Sciences. 162 (5): 710–729. doi:10.1007/s10958-009-9655-0.