Physicists construct theories to describe nature. Let us explain it through an analogy with something that we can do in our everyday life, like going on a hike in the mountains. To avoid getting lost, ...

If standard quantum theory holds up, imaginary numbers are critical. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. Imaginary numbers are ...

In a recent study, mathematicians from Freie Universität Berlin have demonstrated that planar tiling, or tessellation, is much more than a way to create a pretty pattern. Consisting of a surface ...

A century ago, the strange behavior of atoms and elementary particles led physicists to formulate a new theory of nature. That theory, quantum mechanics, found immediate success, proving its worth ...

Back in 1948, the journal Physical Review published a paper entitled “Space-Time Approach to Quantum Electrodynamics” by a young physicist named R.P. Feynman at Cornell University. The paper described ...

Several years ago one of us, Toni, asked another of us, Marco, to come to his office at the Institute of Photonic Sciences, a large research center in Castelldefels near Barcelona. “There is a problem ...

To celebrate Pi Day, we asked several mathematicians to tell us their favorite non-pi numbers. Here are some of their answers. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate ...

What is it that makes Euler's identity, e]iPi + 1 = 0, so special? In Euler's Pioneering Equation Robin Wilson shows how this simple, elegant, and profound formula links together perhaps the five most ...

The basic building blocks of the whole numbers remain mysterious.

Dr Vesife Hatisaru took a look at one of the hardest questions from this year’s mathematics specialist exam, which focused on complex numbers.