Original film · Patterns and geometry
Why the Golden Angle Creates Sunflower Spirals
Place seeds with the same turn each time and see why rational angles form spokes while the golden angle produces changing spiral families.
Transcript
How can one small turn change an entire seed head? Place each new seed farther from the centre and turn by the same angle. At one hundred and twenty degrees, every third seed returns to the same ray. At one hundred and thirty-five, eight repeating arms appear. Now choose the golden angle. It never repeats an exact ray in the ideal geometry, although a finite pattern can show near alignments and spiral families. Add more seeds and watch those families change. Real plants do not all follow one perfect rule. Grow the pattern at Explainer Tools dot com.