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Text, Bytes and Videotape

How can a 3 hour long film like the Lord of the Rings fit on a single DVD? Hw cn U rd txt msgs? How do MP3s make music files smaller, so they can be downloaded faster off the Internet? All these things rely on the mathematics of data compression.
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Newton and the kissing problem

In 1694, a famous discussion between two of the leading scientists of the day - Isaac Newton and David Gregory - took place on the campus of Cambridge University. The discussion concerned the kissing problem, but it was to be another 260 years before the problem was finally solved.
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Editorial

  • Information overload - how mathematicians are helping us all to make sense of the vast amount of information now available to us
  • Sum problems - can you be good at mathematics without being good at arithmetic?
  • Readers' corner - Meet Mandy, the cuddly Mandelbrot set!
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All tied up

What do tying your shoe laces and Santa's Christmas Eve journey have in common?
Article

Mathematical mysteries: The gentlemen from Basle and the Petersburg Paradox

Just over 220 years have passed since the death of one of the most distinguished mathematicians in history: Daniel Bernoulli, who died on March 17th, 1782. The name of Bernoulli asks for precision since the family from Basle produced no fewer than eight outstanding mathematicians within three generations.
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More or Less

A new series of More or Less, BBC Radio 4's series devoted to all things numerical, starts on November 12th. Presenter Andrew Dilnot tells Plus about the motivation behind the programme.
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The golden ratio and aesthetics

It was Euclid who first defined the Golden Ratio, and ever since people have been fascinated by its extraordinary properties. Find out if beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and how the Golden Ratio crosses from mathematics to the arts.