Phi

For other uses, see Phi (disambiguation).

Phi (uppercase/lowercase Φ φ), is the 21st letter of the Greek alphabet, used to represent the "ph" sound in Ancient Greek. This sound changed to "f" some time in the 1st century AD, and in Modern Greek the letter denotes the "f" sound. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of 500. The Cyrillic letter Ф came from Phi. In English, φ is pronounced like "f" but transliterated (re-written) as "ph" in words which originate in Ancient Greek. In those words which originate in Modern Greek, such as feta cheese, φ is transliterated as "f". The letter Phi is used to represent the golden ratio (which is about 1.618). Also used in many other languages (Russian, Belarusian, etc...)

Related pages

• Euler's totient function