click here for the plus home page
© 1997-2009, Millennium Mathematics Project, University of Cambridge.
Permission is granted to print and copy this page on paper for non-commercial use. For other uses, including electronic redistribution, please contact us.
Do you know what's good for you?
icon

Understand the maths behind health and medicine

Careers with maths
icon

Gavin Harper is a mathematician working right at the heart of genetics

A favourite from the archive...
Subscribe to our RSS feed:
AddThis Feed Button subscribe to our RSS feed
 
March 2010
Tags

Kepler's conjecture

Tags: history of mathematics : three-dimensional packing : sphere packing problem : Kepler's conjecture


In the first of our tenth birthday year issues, Plus is celebrating the very best that maths has to offer. If you've ever wanted to fly with the birds and swim with the fishes, get the inside knowledge on great London landmarks or just enjoy going to the movies, then this is the issue for you. And we also say happy birthday to the great mathematician Leonard Euler.

Tags: prime number : Fermat's Last Theorem : fields medal : mathematics in the media : computer science : Poincare Conjecture : physics : search engine : Kepler's conjecture : plus birthday : prime number distribution


Feature icon

It's International Year of Astronomy and all eyes are on Galileo Galilei, whose astronomical observations 400 years ago revolutionised our understanding of the Universe. But few people know that Galileo wasn't the first to build a telescope and turn it on the stars. That honour falls to a little-known mathematician called Thomas Harriot, who excelled in many other ways too. Anna Faherty takes us on a tour of his work.

Tags: refraction : astronomy : algebra : snell's law : Kepler's conjecture : binary number


Feature icon

Has mathematics become an experimental science?

Tags: proof : Kepler's conjecture