On March 20, American-Canadian mathematician Robert Langlands received the Abel Prize, celebrating lifetime achievement in mathematics. Langlands’ research demonstrated how concepts from geometry, ...

Katie has a PhD in maths, specializing in the intersection of dynamical systems and number theory. She reports on topics from maths and history to society and animals. Katie has a PhD in maths, ...

Anita Ponsaing receives funding from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Mathematical & Statistical Frontiers (ACEMS). Most people will probably remember the times tables from primary school quizzes.

While I was looking for a gift for a child’s birthday, a math book fell into my hands. I am always fascinated when authors write about abstract scientific topics for children, whether it’s on Albert ...

This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American When I saw a math paper with the phrase ...

A prime number is a whole number greater than one that has exactly two factors. Those two factors are one and the number itself. This definition is found across many school curriculums. Examples ...

Prime numbers might just have lost their mystery – and online security could change forever. At a basic level, prime numbers are relatively simple to understand. They can only be divided by themselves ...

Luke Durant was folding his laundry right into his suitcase ahead of a trip back home to Alabama when he decided to check his computer and see if he had made history. He figured that, like every other ...

On Jan. 25, the largest known prime number, 2^57,885,161-1, was discovered on Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search (GIMPS) volunteer Curtis Cooper's computer. The new prime number, 2 ...

The Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search (GIMPS) has discovered the new largest known prime number, having 22,338,618 digits, on a university computer volunteered by Curtis Cooper for the project. The ...