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Solution: ‘How Equality and Inequality Shape Birds and Bees’
Puzzle solvers explored how evolution may have used negative and positive control mechanisms to shape the conflicting parental functions of reproduction and child rearing.
New Proof Shows Infinite Curves Come in Two Types
Alexander Smith’s work on the Goldfeld conjecture reveals fundamental characteristics of elliptic curves.
Mystery Math Whiz and Novelist Advance Permutation Problem
A new proof from the Australian science fiction writer Greg Egan and a 2011 proof anonymously posted online are now being hailed as significant advances on a puzzle mathematicians have been studying for at least 25 years.
Without a Proof, Mathematicians Wonder How Much Evidence Is Enough
A new statistical model appears to undermine long-held assumptions in number theory. How much should it be trusted when all that really matters is proof?
Scientists Learn the Ropes on Tying Molecular Knots
As chemists tie the most complicated molecular knot yet, biophysicists create a “periodic table” that describes what kinds of knots are possible.
The (Imaginary) Numbers at the Edge of Reality
Odd enough to potentially model the strangeness of the physical world, complex numbers with “imaginary” components are rooted in the familiar.
A Proof About Where Symmetries Can’t Exist
In a major mathematical achievement, a small team of researchers has proven Zimmer’s conjecture.
How Equality and Inequality Shape the Birds and the Bees
Two dynamic, seemingly opposing forces likely played an important role in the evolution of reproduction and child rearing in social animals like bees and humans.
Graduate Student Solves Quantum Verification Problem
Urmila Mahadev spent eight years in graduate school solving one of the most basic questions in quantum computation: How do you know whether a quantum computer has done anything quantum at all?