tingilinde

42 falls!

Douglas would be happy..  all numbers up to 100 can be represented as the sum of three integer cubes

 

the history of computer

Katherine Johnson is 101 today

 

a non-technical discussion of new crypto techniques to counter the rise of quantum computing attacks

Viable quantum computing attacks on cryptography are still in the future, but people realize it's coming and are working on counter measures.  A nice non-technical piece in Science. 

snip

...

A full-fledged quantum computer is still years, if not decades, away. But developers have long thought that its killer app will be decoding encrypted messages on the internet and elsewhere, be they state secrets or personal information. That prospect has galvanized cryptographers. At a meeting this week in Santa Barbara, California, they will discuss nearly two dozen schemes for encrypting messages in ways that even quantum computers cannot crack.

The workshop is part of a push by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to set standards for so-called postquantum cryptography. The multiyear effort may sound premature and a bit paranoid, as such a quantum computer may never exist. But cryptographers say now is the time to prepare, especially because anybody could record sensitive communications now and decipher them later. “If you wait until we have a quantum computer it’s too late,” says Tanja Lange, a cryptographer at Eindhoven University of Technology in the Netherlands. “Every day that we don’t have postquantum cryptography is a day the data is leaked.”

...

a tip of the hat to Sukie

 

638 and flying straight

Some math fun with Neil Sloane - the OEIS is here.

 

good gosh

The sensitivity conjecture has been proven and the proof is simple. 

Probably for math and CS types, but something people thought difficult has a shockingly simple proof.  Quanta has a piece on it  It was even summarized in a tweet (if the tweet doesn't make sense ignore this one.  You need a bit of background that's probably obscure to most)

 

 

 

poppy northcott

A short tweet storm on mathematical member of the technical staff Poppy Northcott.

part of Apollo

 

 

 

everyone's a royal baby

from the always entertaining Numberphile

curve fitting, autocorrelation and eugenics

A nice little essay with a bit of math that touches on the beginnings of eugenics. It makes a nice companion to the first few chapters of Carl Zimmer's She Has Her Mother's Laugh.

 

progress in the sum of three cubes problem

Since the advent of digital computers mathematicians have been looking for integer solutions for k = x³ + y³ + z³, for k up to 100.   33 and 42 have been the big challenges.   Now there is just one left. Somehow it seems fitting and Douglas Adams would smile. 

Alan notes his standard comments before the solution is given: 

it is easy to show...

with a little algebra we get...

 

 

 

42 is indeed special

The sum of three cubes problem...    Douglas would be happy