A mathematical surface known as the Klein bottle is like a mischievous, mathematical cousin of the Moebius Strip, where the inside and the outside are the same side. Among topologists, the Klein bottle is well known as an example of a closed, nonorientable surface. Thanks to artist Bathsheba Grossman, whose sculptures bring […]
Mathematics in Metal Read More »
In central California’s Yosemite National Park, it doesn’t take much to set the forest on fire. A discarded cigarette. A match. Or, as is often the case, a bolt of lightning. On July 31, 2011, thunder boomed as a severe storm pelted the park. The lightning struck trees, igniting several fires. Firefighters with the
For doctors who treat trauma patients, prediction is key: Will a patient die in the next 30 minutes? Why or why not? What about the next six hours? And after that? What’s the best treatment? How might the patient respond to that treatment in the best- and worst-case scenarios? Then what? These are mortal questions:
The universe is a grand book, Galileo noted in 1623, written in the language of mathematics. Those poor souls who don’t understand that language, he cautioned, wander about in a “dark labyrinth.” I wrote a short piece about math in poetry for PNAS; read the whole thing here. Image: painting by Niklaus Bernoulli
A typical performance by dancers Karl Schaffer and Erik Stern begins with a handshake. However, it’s not simple: the two men fail to connect, missing hands and falling past each other, over and over, in a variety of ways. When they do finally grasp hands, they have to face the opposite problem: they’re unable
Two Guys Dancing about Math Read More »
For years, biologist Susi von Oettingen at the US Fish and Wildlife Service tracked the devastation in New England wrought by White Nose Syndrome (WNS), a disease that infects hibernating bats. By some estimates, the disease has killed nearly seven million bats since it was first detected in a New York cave in 2006.
Northern Hibernaculum Read More »
Some problems have easy solutions. If we feel sweaty, we’ll head for the shade. If our soup’s too hot, we’ll blow on it. If a room’s too stuffy, we’ll open a window. But what are the options when the planet grows too warm? That is the problem — and an enormous one —
Hacking the Planet Read More »
Three days before Christmas in 1995, Linda Horton, a medical researcher in Nashville, Tenn., was diagnosed with a large, fast-growing tumor in her breast. She quickly began her treatment course: chemotherapy to shrink the tumor, followed by a mastectomy—her doctors then told her the cancer was stage II—and additional chemotherapy afterward. Horton didn’t
More than a signature Read More »
A person with a failing vital organ usually has only one treatment option: get a new one. But right now, that often means joining a long waiting list and hoping for the best. Moving up that list means someone ahead of you gets taken off it – either through their death, donation from a living
J. Herbert Waite was a graduate student in biochemistry in the 1970s when he began to wonder how mussels cling to rocks in the turbulent intertidal zone, where they slurp nourishing plankton from the water. So in summers and fall, Waite donned Wellington boots and rubber gloves and headed for the Connecticut shore near Rocky
Mussels’ sticky feet lead to applications Read More »
