In 2007, Gabor Domokos, research professor at the Department of Morphology and Geometric Modeling at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, successfully discovered and created a unique shape, the Gomboc, much to the astonishment of the scientific community. Since then, Gomboc has become increasingly popular and is used and draws inspiration in many fields. In our article, we present another amazing discovery called Bille.

Now a new object has been discovered that seems mathematically impossible at first glance, but so far seems to be very useful in space research, although it will hopefully soon find applications in other scientific fields as well.

Created in 2007, Gomboc is the first and only known convex shape made of homogeneous material that has only one stable and one unstable equilibrium point. With its curved sides, it functions like a roly-poly toy. Gabor Domokos’s latest discovery is another object with similar movement, but with the difference that Bille is bounded exclusively by flat surfaces and a single homogeneous material is not sufficient for its creation.

Let’s take a look at what exactly this new discovery is and why it is so special?

To make it easier to visualize, let’s think of Bille as a four-sided, pyramid-like shape with sides of different sizes, formed by triangular flat plates. Based on our current scientific knowledge, it would have been difficult to imagine that an object like this could always return to its stable starting point. However, Gabor Domokos and his team have recently created just that. Carbon fibers and tungsten carbide alloy were used to construct Bille. The light and thin carbon body ensures that the sides are held in place, but its weight allows it to tilt easily towards the heavier side. Although other materials were considered during the design process, they could only be used in larger sizes. However, further experiments and research will certainly be carried out in the future to try to create this wonderful tetrahedron in different sizes and materials.

As Gabor Domokos thinks, Bille could be an extremely useful discovery in space exploration. For example, many carefully planned research projects have been thwarted by the overturning of the equipment. This is a problem that space researchers try very hard to prevent and eliminate wherever possible, yet during previous expeditions they have repeatedly had to deal with their equipment losing its balance. With Bille, this problem may soon be a thing of the past, and geometry may also be a great help in space exploration.

Bille and Gomboc have opened many previously unknown doors in the world of mathematics and geometry. Based on these great discoveries, the scientific world will be enriched with further ideas and discoveries in the future, which we will also report on in our articles.