Mathematical Developments in 1996 (UMAP)

After several years of suspense and excitement about the proof of Fermat's last theorem, the achievements in 1996 were not as spectacular as those of previous years, yet they were still surprising in their own way. A computer proved a mathematical theorem that had frustrated mathematicians for decades; a solutioncame to light at last for exactly predicting the motions of interacting celestial bodies; and mathematicians showed how wild-card poker is wildly paradoxical. A new largest prime was discovered, and pi was computed to a record 6.4 billion decimal places. Meanwhile, as physicists began designing the first quantum computers, mathematicians and computer scientists were already designing algorithms to run on them.

Table of Contents:

INTRODUCTION

A COMPUTER DOES MATHEMATICS

THE n-BODY PROBLEM HAS BEEN SOLVED

WILD-CARD POKER IS TRULY WILD INDEED

ALGORITHMS FOR QUANTUM COMPUTERS

NEW PRIMES

MORE AND MORE DIGITS OF PI

MILESTONES

REFERENCES

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

ABOUT THE AUTHOR