Each edge of the tetrahedron \(ABCD\) has unit length. The face
\(ABC\) is horizontal, and
\(P\) is the point in \(ABC\) that is vertically below \(D\).
Find the length of \(PD\).
Show that the cosine of the angle between adjacent faces of the
tetrahedron is
\(1/3\).
Find the radius of the largest sphere that can fit inside
the tetrahedron.
Solution:
\(D\) must be above the centre (of any kind) of the equilateral triangle \(ABC\). Therefore it is a distance \(\frac23 \frac{\sqrt{3}}2 = \frac{\sqrt{3}}3\) from \(A\). \(D\) is \(1\) from \(A\), therefore by Pythagoras \(PD = \sqrt{1-\frac13} = \sqrt{\frac23}\)
We can place \(D\) at \(\langle 0,0,\sqrt{\frac23}\rangle\) and \(A'\) (the midpoint of \(BC\)) at \(\langle-\frac{\sqrt{3}}{6},0,0 \rangle\) and we find:
\begin{align*}
&& \cos \theta &= \frac{(\mathbf{a}'-\mathbf{d})\cdot \mathbf{a}'}{|\mathbf{a}'-\mathbf{d}|| \mathbf{a}'|} \\
&&&= \frac{|\mathbf{a}'|}{|\mathbf{a}'-\mathbf{d}|} \\
&&&= \frac{\frac{\sqrt{3}}{6}}{\sqrt{\frac23+\frac{3}{36}}} = \frac13
\end{align*}
We have
And therefore we must have \(\tan \frac{\cos^{-1} \frac13}{2} = \frac{r}{\frac{\sqrt{3}}{6}}\) therefore
\begin{align*}
&& r &= \frac{\sqrt{3}}{6} \tan \left (\frac{\cos^{-1} \frac13}{2} \right) \\
&&&= \frac{\sqrt{3}}6 \sqrt{\frac{1-\cos(\cos^{-1}\frac13)}{1+\cos(\cos^{-1}\frac13)}} \\
&&&= \frac{\sqrt{3}}6 \sqrt{\frac{\frac23}{\frac43}} \\
&&&= \frac{\sqrt{6}}{12}
\end{align*}