Brunnian Links

These are nontrivial links that become trivial if any number of components are removed. Below are examples of Brunnian links with three, four, and six components. Note that except for the four component link, these links are not in their minimal projection. The three component link (when in a minimal projection) is also known as the Borromean Rings. Information on how the large link was constructed can be found here.

Oblique view
Top view

Side view

Check out an MPEG animation (380 kilobytes) of this link falling apart when the yellow component is removed (note: the colours are slightly different in the animation).

Stereoscopic 3-D views of two of the links on this page are on-line, as well as a fancy raytracing of the above three links floating in a deep blue sea.

Go to the KnotPlot Site or Rob Scharein's main WWW page.