Complex Projective Line
In mathematics, the Riemann sphere, named after Bernhard Riemann, is a model of the extended complex plane (also called the closed complex plane): the complex plane plus one point at infinity. This extended plane represents the extended complex numbers, that is, the complex numbers plus a value \infty for infinity. With the Riemann model, the point \infty is near to very large numbers, just as the point 0 is near to very small numbers. The extended complex numbers are useful in complex analysis because they allow for division by zero in some circumstances, in a way that makes expressions such as 1/0=\infty well-behaved. For example, any rational function on the complex plane can be extended to a holomorphic function on the Riemann sphere, with the poles of the rational function mapping to infinity. More generally, any meromorphic function can be thought of as a holomorphic function whose codomain is the Riemann sphere. In geometry, the Riemann sphere is the prototypical ex ...
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