math
A Math Couple Solves a Major Group Theory Problem—After 20 Years of Work
Albert Wagner
But one of Malle’s graduate students was on the case. Britta Späth. “Our Obsession” In 2003, Späth arrived at the ...
Undergraduate Disproves 40-Year-Old Conjecture, Invents New Kind of Hash Table
Albert Wagner
In a 1985 paper, the computer scientist Andrew Yao, who would go on to win the A.M. Turing Award, asserted ...
There’s a New Way to Count Prime Numbers
Albert Wagner
But that wasn’t obvious. They’d have to analyze a special set of functions, called Type I and Type II sums, ...
Scientists Establish the Best Algorithm for Traversing a Map
Albert Wagner
“It’s a great algorithm,” said Erik Demaine, a computer scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “It’s very fast, simple, ...
‘Groups’ Underpin Modern Math. Here’s How They Work
Albert Wagner
Figuring out what subgroups a group contains is one way to understand its structure. For example, the subgroups of Z6 ...
‘Gem’ of a Proof Breaks 80-Year-Old Record, Offers New Insights Into Prime Numbers
Albert Wagner
The original version of this story appeared in Quanta Magazine. Sometimes mathematicians try to tackle a problem head on, and ...
