The use of the letter x as a mathematical unknown is a relatively modern convention. Algebra has been around for a lot longer. Daryl Benson/Stockbyte via Getty Images You might be most familiar with x ...

Like a non-competitive Olympics of math, the International Congress of Mathematicians is held every four years, in a different city each time. By invitation only, top mathematicians from around the ...

Two US high schoolers believe they have cracked a mathematical mystery left unproven for centuries. Calcea Johnson and Ne'Kiya Jackson looked at the Pythagorean theorem, foundational to trigonometry.

Many if not most of the articles in Science News involve some math, whether as an essential tool in conducting research or a way to solve real-world problems, such as how to calculate a safer crowd ...

A long-standing mystery about repeating patterns in a two-dimensional mathematical game has been solved after more than 50 years with the discovery of two final pieces in the puzzle. The result is ...

(This program is no longer available for online streaming.) Revisit "The Great Math Mystery," fresh from the archives and just nominated for an Emmy Award. Join NOVA on a mathematical mystery tour—a ...

This is the amount of time Steve Thompson has been toying with the idea of “Prime Target.” Thompson came across a photograph of an ancient Babylonian tablet in a math textbook in the early 1990s, when ...

(This program is no longer available for online streaming.) Revisit "The Great Math Mystery," fresh from the archives and just nominated for an Emmy Award. Join NOVA on a mathematical mystery tour—a ...