How AI and a popular card game can help engineers predict catastrophic failure – by finding the absence of a pattern

What mathematicians call ‘disordered collections’ can help engineers explore real-world worst-case scenarios. The simple card game Set illustrates how to predict internet and electrical grid failures.

John Edward McCarthy, Professor of Mathematics, Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis • conversation
March 26, 2024 • ~7 min

How animals get their skin patterns is a matter of physics – new research clarifying how could improve medical diagnostics and synthetic materials

Understanding how the intricate spots and stripes, or Turing patterns, of many animals form can help scientists mimic those processes in the lab.

Ankur Gupta, Assistant Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering, University of Colorado Boulder • conversation
Nov. 8, 2023 • ~8 min

Why does nature create patterns? A physicist explains the molecular-level processes behind crystals, stripes and basalt columns

Nature begins forming patterns at the molecular level – and sometimes they grow to enormous sizes.

Maxim Lavrentovich, Assistant Professor of Theoretical Biophysics, University of Tennessee • conversation
Sept. 19, 2022 • ~7 min

Happy Twosday! Why numbers like 2/22/22 have been too fascinating for over 2,000 years

Numerology ties in with how our brains work, but that doesn’t mean its claims make sense.

Barry Markovsky, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Sociology, University of South Carolina • conversation
Feb. 17, 2022 • ~9 min

How mutant zebrafish helped unlock the secret to their stripes – new research

We wanted to find out which biological phenomena are crucial for pattern formation and which are just incidental. These sorts of questions can be answered with mathematical modelling.

Christian Yates, Senior Lecturer in Mathematical Biology, University of Bath • conversation
July 28, 2020 • ~7 min

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