A cylinder has a circumference of 24 cm, a height of 4 cm and a diameter of BC. The shortest distance for an ant to start from a and crawl along the surface of the cylinder to point C is much longer

A cylinder has a circumference of 24 cm, a height of 4 cm and a diameter of BC. The shortest distance for an ant to start from a and crawl along the surface of the cylinder to point C is much longer

If you cut the cylinder along the height AB, you will get a rectangle with width ab of 4cm, point C is at the middle of the long side, and the length of BC is half of the circumference of the bottom surface, that is 12cm. If you connect AC, then AC is the shortest distance. If you know the length of two right angle sides, calculate the hypotenuse. Then AC = (4 & sup2; + 12 & sup2;) & frac12; = 4 √ 10cm
That is, the shortest distance for an ant to start from a and crawl along the surface of the cylinder to point C is 4 √ 10 cm