Meet “impossibagel,” a physically impossible bagel that mathematicians use to resolve intricate geometry problems. But impossibagel—and other “impossible objects” in mathematics—is notoriously difficult to replicate, and researchers haven’t been able to fully tap into their mathematical potential. That may no longer be a problem, thanks to a new tool. On Monday, researchers at MIT’s Computer […]
This Weird Pyramid Always Lands on the Same Face, Confirming 40-Year-Old Theory
“Bille” is the first-ever monostable tetrahedron, or a pyramid-like shape with four triangular faces that has one stable resting position. What this means is that Bille, no matter how you throw it and how it lands, will flip back on exactly the same side every single time. In a recent preprint submitted to arXiv, mathematicians […]
India’s ‘Human Calculator Kid’ Shatters 6 World Records in a Single Day
Remember when your teachers used to say that mental math is important because you can’t walk around with a calculator everywhere you go? Never minding the fact that we now do, actually, take a calculator everywhere we go (hello, smartphones), a teenager from India has taken it a step further: He has essentially become a […]
‘A Maze the Size of Earth’: New AI Tackles Math Problems That Take Millions of Steps
Researchers have developed an artificially intelligent system that does the exact opposite of living in the moment. But it doesn’t just think a few steps ahead—it thinks millions of steps ahead. A team led by mathematician Sergei Gukov from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) has created a new type of machine-learning algorithm designed to […]