A superellipse, also known as a Lamé curve after Gabriel Lamé, is a closed curve resembling the ellipse, retaining the geometric features of semi-major axis and semi-minor axis, and symmetry about them, but defined by an equation that allows for various shapes between a rectangle and an ellipse.
In two dimensional Cartesian coordinate system, a superellipse is defined as the set of all points on the curve that satisfy the equationwhere and are positive numbers referred to as semi-diameters or semi-axes of the superellipse, and is a positive parameter that defines the shape. When , the superellipse is an ordinary ellipse. For , the shape is more rectangular with rounded corners, and for , it is more pointed.[1][2][3]
In the polar coordinate system, the superellipse equation is (the set of all points on the curve satisfy the equation):