Helicoid and Twisted Towers

Helicoid or a helical surface is a surface formed by simultaneous translation and rotation (screwmotion) of a line around a fixed axis. This motion provides a circular helicoid which is also a ruled surface and a minimal surface. If we replace the line in the screw motion by any other curve we get a generalized helicoid. In civil engineering or architecture the screw motion mostly can be seen in staircases, but there are more and more buildings resembling a design that corresponds to the screw motion, e.g.“twistedtowers”.