Ask A Scientist General Science Archive

name         Laura T.
status       student
age          16

Question -   What types of careers use trigonometry.  I need to know a
general overview of how trigonometry is used in the profession and at
least one specific problem that the person in the career would solve with
trigonometry.
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I am pretty sure trigonometry is used by surveyors to lay out lot lines, 
etc.
Also, I once saw an episode of "Law and Order" where they determined that a
bullet had come from a building across the street and what floor and window
using trigonometry.

Vanhoeck
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In the electronics fields such as RF and VF.

As a mechanical engineer, I use trigonometry once in a while.
For simple problems, or when I do not have a computer
or CAD program handy, or when I'm impressing the boss,
trig and geometry prove to be fast and useful.

Hope this helps,
-Wil Lam
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Way too numerous to list individually: but here are some categories. Any
type of profession that involves triangles. All types of engineering,
carpentry, machinist, tool and die maker. Any type of profession where
navigation is involved. That would include pilots, navigators, for example.
Any type of profession that deals with alternating electrical currents. That
would include all types of computer engineer and/or technician. Any
profession that uses any type of mechanical oscillation. Any profession that
would use calculus -- and that is a very, very long list.
     The point is that trigonometry is so basic and so intertwined in so many
aspects of math, that to list very specific professions would be hopelessly
incomplete. I'm not sure what the motive behind your question is, but if it
is, "Should I take trigonometry?" The answer is an unqualified YES. You 
cannot get
very far in any technical area without a grounding in trigonometry.

Vince Calder
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Hello,

That is a really good question. It also points to one of the problems in 
teaching math where, without first addressing the relevance or the use 
of  the subject, students are at loss.

Trigonometry is the study of trigons (triangles in Latin) and it was 
invented to study the locations and the movements of the stars and our 
close by planets some of which were thought to rotated around the earth in 
giant circular / spherical orbits while some others were thought to be 
fixed on giant spheres with the earth at the center. Thus, tables of 
"chords of a circle" were compiled at least a century BC for the study of 
locations and movements of these heavenly bodies.   The invention found 
uses also for navigation at sea. Astrology too benefited from the new 
trigonometric knowledge for it helped explain alignments of the stars (but 
perhaps not so much the fortunes of the people).

Trigonometry was later applied to planes and found applications in 
framing, irrigation, architecture, etc.  For example, you could calculate 
the height of a building or a tree without climbing it by merely knowing 
your distance from it and the angle that an imaginary line (ray) drawn 
from the top of the tree makes with the ground at your location.

Optics, or the study of vision and light propagation, was also an early 
beneficiary, as is a modern camera where trigonometric relationships are 
used to design a proper layout for the multiple lenses used in it.
Trigonometry is essentially used wherever we deal with distances and 
angles.   In any career in science, engineering, and mathematics you will 
use trigonometry.  It is hard to escape it; you also need it whether you 
are carpenter, an archeologist, architects, or an artist.

Ali Khounsary, Ph.D.
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A follow-up on this inquiry. The following site provides a good source of
the uses of trig: http://www.themathpage.com/aTrig/trigonometry.htm
Applications are numerous!!!

Vince Calder
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