When Does the Position Vector of a Space Curve Always Lie in Its Rectifying Plane? (Q4416441)

Consider a unit-speed space curve \({\mathbf x}: I\to \mathbb{E}^3\) in Euclidean space \(\mathbb{E}^3\) with nowhere vanishing curvature. Then there is an orthonormal frame formed by the tangent vector \({\mathbf t}\), normal vector \({\mathbf n}\) and the binormal vector \({\mathbf b}\). It is well kown that the curve lies in a plane or in a sphere if the position vector always lies in the osculating plane \([{\mathbf t}, {\mathbf n}]\) or in the normal plane \([{\mathbf n}, {\mathbf b}]\), respectively. The present paper deals with curves, whose position vector always lies in the rectifying plane \([{\mathbf t}, {\mathbf b}]\); the author calls these curves ``rectifying curves''. On the one hand several characterizations of rectifying curves are proved, on the other hand it is shown that these curves can be constructed from unit-speed curves \({\mathbf y}= {\mathbf y}(t)\) in an Euclidean sphere \(S^2\) by \({\mathbf x}(t):= (a(\cos(t))^{-1}) {\mathbf y}(t)\) (\(a\) is a positive real number). It should be mentioned, that the curves in discussion are exactly the geodesics in cones, which is easy to see from the rectifying developable (formed by the rectifying planes of the curve \({\mathbf x}(t)\)). From this point of view many of the above characterizations, especially the construction of these curves can be understood geometrically [see \textit{W. Blaschke}, Differentialgeometrie, Band~1 Elementare Differentialgeometrie, 4. Auflage, Springer, Berlin (1945), \S24, p. 47].