Question

a dilation With a scale factor less than one which reduces the size of the original figure

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GPT-4o mini
A dilation with a scale factor less than one is a transformation that reduces the size of a figure. When performing a dilation, every point of the original figure is moved closer to a fixed point known as the center of dilation. The scale factor determines how much the figure is reduced or enlarged.

Here’s what happens in this case:

1. **Center of Dilation**: This is the point from which all other points are scaled. It can be any point in the plane, including a point inside, outside, or on the original figure.

2. **Scale Factor**: A scale factor \( k \) of less than 1 (for example, \( k = 0.5 \)) means that each point of the figure will be moved closer to the center of dilation. If the original distance from a point to the center of dilation is \( d \), after the dilation, the distance will be \( kd \).

3. **Result**: The result of the dilation is a smaller figure that maintains the same shape as the original figure but is proportionately smaller. The angles remain the same, and the ratios of corresponding sides are preserved.

**Example**: If you have a triangle with vertices at \( A(2, 3) \), \( B(4, 5) \), and \( C(3, 1) \), and you perform a dilation with center at the origin \( O(0, 0) \) and scale factor \( k = 0.5 \), the new vertices after dilation would be:
- \( A'(1, 1.5) \) (calculated as \( (0.5 \times 2, 0.5 \times 3) \))
- \( B'(2, 2.5) \) (calculated as \( (0.5 \times 4, 0.5 \times 5) \))
- \( C'(1.5, 0.5) \) (calculated as \( (0.5 \times 3, 0.5 \times 1) \))

The new triangle \( A'B'C' \) is similar to triangle \( ABC \) but reduced in size by half.

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