Katie Steckles

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HLF Blogs – Math ⇔ Art: what is a rotogon?

By Katie Steckles. Posted September 27, 2017

This week, Katie and Paul are blogging from the Heidelberg Laureate Forum – a week-long maths conference where current young researchers in maths and computer science can meet and hear talks by top-level prize-winning researchers. For more information about the HLF, visit the Heidelberg Laureate Forum website.

Alongside this week’s Laureate Forum, there’s an art exhibition on display in the nearby Old University building. Math ⇔ Art (Math is Art, Art is Math) is a collection of computer-generated artworks by Italian astrophysicist Aldo Spizzichino. In addition to a long career in research and many publications, Spizzichino has also produced an impressive quantity of mathematical art.

Using Fortran to generate computer graphics, Spizzichino has explored many mathematical shapes, structures and ideas through visual representation. The exhibit invites visitors to enjoy the mathematical forms for their own intrinsic beauty and, in Spizzichino’s words, ‘to complete the work with their own interpretation’.

Heidelberg Laureate Forum 2017

By Katie Steckles. Posted September 23, 2017

This week our roving reporters Katie and Paul have gone on a trip to Heidelberg in Germany, where the world’s foremost undergraduate, masters, PhD and postdoc students in maths and computer science are gathering for the fifth annual Heidelberg Laureate Forum.

Carnival of Mathematics 149

By Katie Steckles. Posted September 17, 2017

The next issue of the Carnival of Mathematics, rounding up blog posts from the month of August, and compiled by Mel, is now online at Just Maths.

The Carnival rounds up maths blog posts from all over the internet, including some from our own Aperiodical. See our Carnival of Mathematics page for more information.

919444¹⁰⁴⁸⁵⁷⁶ + 1 is prime

By Katie Steckles. Posted September 4, 2017

Distributed internet prime number search PrimeGrid has found a new largest generalised Fermat prime.

The discovery was made on 29th August, and was double-checked before being announced on 2nd September. PrimeGrid uses a distributed computing approach and uses spare computer time donated by volunteer computers connected to their network.

A generalised Fermat prime is a prime number of the form $a^{2^n} + 1$, with $a \gt 0$. It’s called ‘generalised’ because ‘Fermat prime’ is the name for the particular case $a=2$.

Much like Mersenne primes, there are special tests which make it much easier to check if a number of this form is prime than for a general number. For this reason, they’re a good place to look for new large primes.

Until now only 392 generalised Fermat primes had been found: this new discovery makes 393. At 6,253,210 digits long, it’s now the 12th largest of all known primes, and the second-largest known non-Mersenne prime.

PrimeGrid have put out an announcement in PDF format giving some more details about the search, and credits for the many people involved writing algorithms and providing computers to run them on.

The PrimeGrid homepage has more information about the many different prime number searches they run, and how to join in the search with your own PC.

Maths at the British Science Festival

By Katie Steckles. Posted August 22, 2017

The British Science Festival is organised annually by the British Science Association, and this year it’s hosted by the University of Brighton and the University of Sussex from Tuesday 5 to Saturday 9 September. For more details and full listings, see the main British Science Festival website.

We’ve pulled out some of the mathematics-related events in the main programme – from theatre reproductions to puzzle workshops and plenty of talks and lectures, there’s something for everyone!

New YouTube videos by me and James Grime

By Katie Steckles. Posted August 17, 2017

I’ve been at it again, making videos for that YouTube – this time, a collabo with James Grime. We have each posted a video on the topic of a mathematical game, as we both had things we wanted to make videos about but nobody to play with, so we met up after school and made some YouTubes.

My video features two games which *SPOILER* turn out to have maths in them. I’m also doing a bit of a giveaway on Twitter, where you can win the actual cards used in the video (I will post them out in the IRL post mail), so reply to this tweet if you want a chance to win:

Here’s my video again from the other day. If you’d like to win a set of cards, reply with your own version of ⭐& 🌍: https://t.co/rppBeftpbf

— Katie Steckles (@stecks) August 17, 2017

James has also posted his video, which is about a different game:

My YouTube channel
James’ YouTube channel

Carnival of Mathematics 148

By Katie Steckles. Posted August 3, 2017

The next issue of the Carnival of Mathematics, rounding up blog posts from the month of July, and compiled by Kartik, is now online at Comfortably Numbered.

The Carnival rounds up maths blog posts from all over the internet, including some from our own Aperiodical. See our Carnival of Mathematics page for more information.