Math Digest

Summaries of Media Coverage of Math

Edited by Allyn Jackson, AMS
Contributors: Mike Breen (AMS), Claudia Clark (freelance science writer), Lisa DeKeukelaere (2004 AMS Media Fellow), Annette Emerson (AMS), Brie Finegold (University of California, Santa Barbara), Adriana Salerno (University of Texas, Austin)

2008 Math Digest

December 2008

• "The Numbers Guy" columns, by Carl Bialik, Wall Street Journal Online, December 2008
• "Sexy Maths" columns, by Marcus du Sautoy, Times Online, December 2008
• "University professor knighted," Manchester Evening News, 31 December 2008;
  "Honour for Royal Society luminary," BBC Online, 31 December 2008
• "Steven Strogatz: How things in nature tend to sync up," Exchange Morning Post, 29 December 2008
• "He creates ways of seeing information," Boston Globe, 29 December 2008
• "Prizewinners of the year" and "Images of the Year," Nature, 18/25 December 2008
• "How Madoff Did It," FrontPageMagazine.com, 23 December 2008;
  "Madoff Misled SEC in '06, Got Off," Wall Street Journal Online, 18 December 2008;
  "SEC doing what whistleblower asked, 9 years too late," New York Daily News, 18 December 2008
• "The mathematics of play-calling," Richmond Times-Dispatch, 16 December 2008
• "Specializing in Problems that Only Seem Impossible to Solve," New York Times, 16 December 2008
• "Are you game?": Review of Professor Stewart's Cabinet of Mathematical Curiosities, by Ian Stewart, New Scientist, 13 December 2008
• "Math Gains Reported for U.S. Students," New York Times, 9 December 2008;
  "English children 'best at maths in Europe'," The Times (London), 10 December 2008
• "Winners of Prestigious Student Science Awards Are Named," New York Times, 9 December 2008
• "For Teen Math Whiz, Aptitude Has Ups and Downs," NPR: Morning Edition, 8 December 2008
• "Science Weekly: The pub quiz maths challenge," The Guardian, 8 December 2008
• "Teacher Raises Money By Placing Ads On Tests," NPR Day to Day, 4 December 2008
• "Generosity: A Winner's Advice," Nature, 4 December 2008
• "Mathematician Knows How to Fold 'em," Republican-American of Waterbury, 3 December 2008
• "Herdentrieb und Panikreaktionen statt Angebot und Nachfrage (Herd instinct and panic reaction instead of supply and demand)", Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 3 December 2008
• "Wacklige Tische müssen nicht sein (Wobbly tables need not be)", Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 3 December 2008
• "Best Brains in Science 2008: DISCOVER 50," Discover, December 2008

November 2008

• "Touring Turing": Review of An Annotated Turing, by Charles Petzold, American Scientist, November-December 2008
• "Your secret's not secret anymore": Review of The Numerati, by Stephen Baker, New Scientist, 29 November 2008
• "Move over Dawkins": Interview with Marcus du Sautoy, New Scientist, 29 November 2008
• "If You Liked This, You're Sure to Love That," New York Times Magazine, 23 November 2008
• "The cosmic revolutionary": Interview with Neil Turok, New Scientist, 22 November 2008
• "Global Perspectives," Science, 21 November 2008
• "Draft Class," ESPN The Magazine, 17 November 2008
• "No last hurrah": Review of The Last Theorem, by Arthur C. Clarke and Frederik Pohl, New Scientist, 15 November 2008
• "Rappin' Math Teacher Gets Top Honor," KPBS Radio, 13 November 2008
• "An Infinite Beautiful Mind," Science News, 8 November 2008
• "Any Kid Can Learn Math," Globe and Mail, 8 November 2008

October 2008

• Articles on deciphering the opening chord of the Beatles' "A Hard Day's Night", October, November, and December 2008
  
• Articles about Marcus du Sautoy, October and November 2008
• Articles about AMS Notices study of girls in high-level math competitions, October 2008
• "TierneyLab: A Beautiful Math," New York Times, 28 October 2008
• "It's all in the numbers: Math art subject of exhibit," Shreveport Times, 26 October 2008
• "And the winner is...", New Scientist, 25 October 2008
• "Disputed Definitions," Nature, 23 October 2008
• "Master talent at the top," Sowetan, 20 October 2008
• "Berkeley woman among 80 trailblazers in Oprah's magazine", Oakland Tribune, 18 October 2008
• "Knot or not?", New Scientist, 18 October 2008
• "Counting Fish," Nature, 16 October 2008
• "Exhausted jugglers find opportunity in becoming mathematicians," Irish Times, 15 October 2008;
  "Stratocaster helps explain magic of maths," Irish Times, 16 October 2008
• "Q & A with Donald Saari about election math," Independent Weekly, 15 October 2008
• "Divide and conquer, and get the chicken," Boston Globe, 13 October 2008
• "Feeling Financial Pain? First, Blame All the Scientists," USA Today, 13 October 2008
• "Artificial Intelligence Prize Goes to Chatty Computer", National Public Radio, 14 October 2008;
  "Test explores if robots can think", BBC News, 12 October 2008
• "Chaos--Mathematical and Financial," ABCNews.com, 5 October 2008
• "Sexy maths: Primes of passion," The Times Online, 1 October 2008
• "Outcalculating the Competition," Scientific American, October 2008

September 2008

• "'X=Why?' A Year Reliving High School Mathematics," Washington Post Blog, 28 September 2008
• "Electrons as Math Whizzes," Science News, 27 September 2008
• "11-Year-Old Math Wizard Snags TV Award," People, 26 September 2008
• "The Mathematician And The Pig," Forbes, 24 September 2008
• "X = 50 Semesters," New York Times (Sunday magazine), 21 September 2008
• "Students in advanced math classes are doing worse, according to private researchers [sic] report," Chicago Tribune, 21 September 2008
• Articles about discovery of 45th and 46th Mersenne prime numbers
• "It's Likely That Times Are Changing," Science News, 13 September 2008
• "Queuing conundrums," The Economist, 11 September 2008
• "Oded Schramm," The Telegraph, 19 September 2008;
  "Oded Schramm, 46, Mathematician, Is Dead," The New York Times, 11 September 2008
• "The greatest theorem ever told: London calling with a new multimedia performance in Ann Arbor," Detroit Metro Times, 10 September 2008
• "Do numbers have personalities? You can count on it," The Herald (U.K.), 6 September 2008;
  "Baez to play three gigs in Glasgow," Hi-Tech Scotland, 9 September 2008
• "Meeting Briefs: MathFest 2008," Science, 5 September 2008
• "Mathematical Biology Center Launched", Nature, 4 September 2008
• "Die Facetten der Mathematik (The facets of mathematics)": Review of Kaleidoskop der Mathematik (Mathematical Kaleidoscope), by E. Behrends, P. Gritzmann, and G. Ziegler, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 3 September 2008
• "How to keep secrets safe," Scientific American, September 2008
• "Putting the science in fiction", Black Enterprise, September 2008

August 2008

• Obituaries for Henri Cartan, August 2008
• Articles on the value of preschool on mathematics achievement, August 2009
• "Top-seeded Ivanovic loses in huge upset at US Open," USA Today, 28 August 2008
• "Math Problem: Democratic Convention's Logistics," National Public Radio, 27 August 2008
• "Book Excerpt: The Numerati, Business Week, 26 August 2008; "Our Digital Lives, Monitored by a Hidden 'Numerati'": Interview with author Stephen Baker, National Public Radio, 2 October 2008
• "Algebra---it's everywhere," San Francisco Chronicle, 25 August 2008
• "Russians dent Google's world domination," TimesOnline, 24 August 20008
• "Die perfekte 400-Meter-Laufbahn (The perfect 400-meter track)", Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 24 August 2008
• "A head for figures", New Scientist, 23 August 2008
• "Departments Scramble to Find Math Education Faculty," Science, 22 August 2008
• "Battling bureaucracy with maths," Nature news, 22 August 2008
• "Seeing in Four Dimensions," Science News, 22 August 2008
• "Chinese math students believe destiny is in the numbers," NBC Nightly News, aired 20 August 2008
• "Spencer Peak added to Colorado mountain lexicon," Denver Post, 18 August 2008;
  "San Juans peak named in honor of local activist," Durango Telegraph, 28 August 2008
• "The code breaker": Interview with Jacques Stern, New Scientist, 16 August 2008
• "Why do erudite people boast of blissful ignorance of maths?", Irish Times, 16 August 2008
• "Decrypting God's Language, and Other Items From Professors' Crackpot Files," Chronicle of Higher Education, 15 August 2008
• "Madison High teen known for his brilliance in math wins US$50K scholarship," The Daily Record, 14 August 2008
• "Canadian Mathematicians, Grad Students to Fight AIDS with Numbers," Macleans OnCampus, 13 August 2008
• "Cal scientists on the trail of invisibility," San Francisco Chronicle, 12 August 2008;
  "Light bent the wrong way--can an invisibility cloak be far behind?" by J.R. Minkel. Scientific American, 12 August 2008;
  "Scientists Engineer Material That Bends Light," by Jessica Berman. Voice of America News, 12 August 2008.
  "Invisibility-Cloak Materials Bend Light 'Backward'," by Brian Handwerk. National Geographic, 12 August 2008.
  "Muggles A Step Closer To Creating Invisibility Cloak," on Morning Edition. National Public Radio, 12 August 2008.
• "Educators Peer Over Students' Shoulders at Mich. Math Lab," Education Week, 11 August 2008
• "On trail of elusive carbon footprint," Chicago Tribune, 10 August 2008
• "Cube routes", New Scientist, 9 August 2008
• "'Kiss My Math' Tries to Make Pre-Algebra Cool": Interview with Danica KcKellar, Talk of the Nation, National Public Radio, 8 August 2008
• "Simon Phillips Norton: Travelling by Numbers," Daily Telegraph (U.K.), 8 August 2008
• "The Science of Doping," Nature, 7 August 2008
• "Celebrities," Science, 1 August 2008
• "Settling the Score," Popular Science, August 2008

July 2008

• Articles on math and gender, July 2008
• "Was ancient Greek 'computer' an astronomical tool?," New Scientist, 30 July 2008;
  "Complex clock combines calendars," Nature, 31 July 2008;
  "Discovering How Greeks Computed in 100 B.C.," New York Times, 31 July 2008
• "A tale of two tilings," Nature, 24 July 2008
• "A Building of Bubbles," Science News, 19 July 2008
• "Brazil's Pirahã grasp numbers without words," Science News, 19 July 2008
  "We are natural born mathematicians," The Telegraph, 18 August 2008
• "Obama's shifts could be costly," Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, 17 July 2008
• "Einstein, Plato... and you?", The Telegraph, 15 July 2008
• "In search of a beautiful mind," Boston Globe, 12 July 2008
• "A mind-bending reef," New Scientist, 5 July 2008
• "Before Microsoft, Gates Solved a Pancake Problem," Morning Edition, National Public Radio, 4 July 2008
• "Art Authentication," NOVA ScienceNow, PBS, 2 July 2008
• "Why Laughing Matters," Discover, July 2008
• "The Self-Organizing Quantum Universe," Scientific American, July 2008
• "Simple Groups at Play," Scientific American, July 2008
• "Under Fire," National Geographic, July 2008

June 2008

• "When her numbers are up, it's bad news," Boston Globe, 30 June 2008
• Articles about study on preparation of math teachers, June 2008
• "Nabbing suspicious SNPs," Science News, 21 June 2008
• "How hard can it be?", New Scientist, 21 June 2008
• "Ancient Symmetries": Review of Solving Stonehenge: The new key to an ancient enigma, by Anthony Johnson, New Scientist, 21 June 2008
• "Just Like the CBS Drama NUMB3RS: Police Use Math to Crack the Case," WPEC-TV, 20 June 2008
• "Film crystallizes life of Nobel winner Hauptman," Buffalo Business First, 20 June 2008
• "The MPG Illusion," Science, 20 June 2008
• "Universal law of coiling," Nature, 19 June 2008
• "Playing by numbers," Nature, 19 June 2008
• "Professor Finds the Art in Both Numbers and Letters: A Conversation with Manil Suri," New York Times, 17 June 2008
• "18-Year-Old is World's Youngest College Professor," Voice of America, 16 June 2008
• "Grand designs", New Scientist, 14 June 2008
• "The Mathematical Mirror to Animal Nature," Nature, 14 June 2008
• "Students show their smarts at international science fair," Science News, 7 June 2008;
  "New Math Theorem Takes Second Place at Intel Science Fair," Calgary Herald, 12 June 2008
• "What are the odds?: Excerpt from The Drunkard’s Walk," The Week Daily, 6 June 2008
• "Most influential women scientist search is on," Daily Telegraph, 6 June 2008
• "Astronomy Study Proves Mathematics Theorem," NewScientist, 5 June 2008
  "Accidental Astrophysicists," Science News Online, 13 June 2008
  "Die Lösung steht in den Sternen (The solution lies in the stars)", Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 20 July 2008
• Articles on knitting and crocheting mathematical objects, June and July 2008
• "Digital Image Forensics," Scientific American, June 2008;
  "Profile: Hany Farid," NOVA ScienceNOW, PBS, 25 June 2008

May 2008

• "Wagering with Zero," American Scientist, May/June 2008
• Articles about David Mumford donating his share of the Wolf Prize to Palestinian causes, May and June 2008
• "The Science of Fun," The Guardian (U.K.), 31 May 2008
• "Math Skills for Nonmajors Don't Add Up," Chronicle of Higher Education, 30 May 2008
• "Vital statistics," The Economist, 29 May 2008;
  "Culture, Gender, and Math," Science, 30 May 2008;
  "Gender equality helps girls with math, study says," Philadephia Inquirer, 30 May 2008
• "Number keys promise safer data",BBC News, 21 May 2008
• "American and Frenchman accept the 2008 Abel mathematics prize in Norway", The Associated Press, 20 May 2008;
  "The Abel Prize Awarded Thompson and Tits," Norway Post, 22 May 2008
• "The Intrigue of the Interface," Science, 16 May 2008
  "Drink Up," Boston Globe, 19 May 2008
• "Wie Babys Statistik anwenden können (How babies can use statistics)", Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 18 May 2008
• "Tones from Ancient Greece," Science, 16 May 2008
• "Variationen zu einer Vermutung Eulers (Variation on a proof of Euler)", Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 14 May 2008
• "Measuring The China Earthquake's Magnitude," Wall Street Journal, 12 May 2008
• "Some swans are grey," New Scientist, 10 May 2008
• "Victorville math students learn how trigonometry is used in crime scene investigations," Press-Enterprise, 9 May 2008
• "Math Group Tries to Help Young Teachers Stay the Course," Education Week, 7 May 2008
• "Sin cities," New Scientist, 3 May 2008
• "Wishing for an African Einstein" and "An African Showcase for Math Studies," Science, 2 May 2008
• "Fix Rochester schools `outside the box'," Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, 14 May 2008;
  "Confronting our `broken' math system," Providence Journal, 2 May 2008

April 2008

• "A life of unexpected twists takes her from farm to math department," The Boston Globe, 28 April 2008
• "Math Discovered or Invented?" Canada Free Press, 28 April 2008
• "Study Suggests Math Teachers Scrap Balls and Slices," New York Times, 25 April 2008
• "Bad Math = Mad Politics," Wall Street Journal Online, 25 April 2008
• "Mapmaker for the World of Influenza," Science, 18 April 2008
• "Frustration in Complexity," Science, 18 April 2008
• "Geometrical Music Theory," Science, 18 April 2008;
  "The shape of Beethoven's Ninth," ScienceNews, 24 May 2008
• "Edward N. Lorenz, 90; scientist developed influential chaos theory," Los Angeles Times, 18 April 2008
  "Eye for Detail." Newsmakers, Science, 25 April 2008
• "Awards," Science, 18 April 2008
• "The Quirky Math of Voting: Oddities and Anomolies are always possible," Philadelphia Inquirer, 13 April 2008
• "Random Stock Market Quite Ordered," Daily News and Analysis, 12 April 2008
• "Creeping Up on Riemann," Science News Online, 5 April 2008
• "Doing the iPod Shuffle," NPR Weekend Edition, 5 April 2008
• "Creating Musical Variation," Science, 4 April 2008
• "Building a mechanical calculator from 19th century plans," Computer World Australia, 4 April 2008
  "Difference Engine No. 2--No. 2," Scientific American, July 2008
• Articles on Aztec math, April 2008
• "At the Edge of Life's Code," Scientific American, April 2008

March 2008

• Two reviews of Flatland: The Movie, New Scientist, 29 March 2008
• "In höhere Dimensionen (In higher dimensions)," Die Zeit, 28 March 2008;
  "Verschollenes Genie (Missing Genius)," Neues Zürcher Zeitung, 27 April 2008
  "Sensitivity to the Harmony of Things," Science News, 9 May 2008
• Articles about the 2008 Abel Prize, March 2008
• Articles on report of the National Mathematics Advisory Panel, March 2008
• "Paola Antonelli + Benoit Mandelbrot": A conversation, Seed Magazine, 24 March 2008
• "Prime suspect", New Scientist, 22 March 2008
• "Women in Math? City Tech Profs Say We Need More," Brooklyn Eagle, 21 March 2008
• "Math Major Explains Method to March Madness", National Public Radio, 20 March 2008;
  "CofC Students Predict 'Final Four' Using Math Calculations," WCSC-TV, 22 March 2008
• "Arthur C. Clarke, 90, Science Fiction Writer, Dies," New York Times, 19 March 2008
• "Let's talk about figures," The Economist, 19 March 2008
• "His puzzling avocation is no trivial pursuit," Boston Globe, 17 March 2008
• "Cryptologists Cook Up Some Hash for New 'Bake-Off'," Science, 14 March 2008
• "In U.S. Politics, Party Rule Flips Like Clockwork," Discovery Channel News, 13 March 2008
• "All eyes on the Amazon": Interview with Carlos Nobre, Nature, 13 March 2008
• "Africa Steps Up Efforts to Train Top Scientists," Chronicle of Higher Education, 7 March 2008
• "Want to Save a Coral Reef? Bring Along Your Crochet Needles," New York Times, 4 March 2008
• "Are Our Brains Wired for Math?", New Yorker, 3 March 2008
• "A Mathematical Tragedy: Sophie Germain had a bold program to prove Fermat's Last Theorem," Science News Online, Week of 1 March 2008;
  "NMSU professor unearths manuscripts of first female mathematics researcher," Las Cruces Sun-News, 24 March 2008
• "The Unknown Einstein", special issue of Discover, March 2008

February 2008

• "Strict Ordering Slashes Tarmac Time," Nature, 28 February 2008
• "Teaching a computer to appreciate art," msnbc.com, 25 February 2008
• "Casino Security: Counting a legend," Las Vegas Review-Journal, 25 February 2008
• "An Attack on Fermat," Science News Online, Week of 23 February 2008
• "Maths in action": Review of How Round is Your Circle?, by John Bryant and Chris Sangwin, New Scientist, 23 February 2008
• "Looking behind the numbers": Interview with John Ioannidis, New Scientist, 16 February 2008
• Articles about sessions at the 2008 Joint Mathematics Meetings, Science, 15 February 2008
• "Baseball's Devil May Not Be in the Details," New York Times, 10 February 2008
• "Russian immigrant solves math puzzle," The Jerusalem Post, 8 February 2008;
  "Israeli immigrant solves 38-year-old math problem," Israel 21C, 18 February 2008
• "How Much is a Trillion?" Science Friday, National Public Radio, 8 February 2008
• "A Human Rights Statistician Finds Truth in the Numbers," Christian Science Monitor, 7 February 2008;
  "The Forensic Humanitarian," New York Times Magazine, 17 February 2008
• "On the Job: Math mavens seek solutions", Poughkeepsie Journal, 5 February 2008
• "Microsoft Adds Research Lab in East as Others Cut Back," New York Times, 4 February 2008
• "No god required": Review of Irreligion, by John Allen Paulos, New Scientist, 2 February 2008
• "In the Movies," Science, 1 February 2008
• "When Math Warps Elections," Newsweek, 4 February 2008

January 2008

• "Math + Religion = Trouble", Toronto Star, 26 January 2008
• "Benjamin Franklin Plays Sudoku," Science News Online, 26 January 2008
• "Berkeley math institute celebrates 25 years," San Francisco Chronicle, 25 January 2008
• "Math is a ball!", ABC6 TV Action News, 25 January 2008
• "Lazy option is best when waiting for the bus", New Scientist, 23 January 2008;
  "Wann es sich lohnt, auf das Tram zu warten (When it pays to wait for the bus)", Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 24 February 2008
• "Celia Hoyles: the magic of numbers", The Guardian (UK), 22 January 2008
• "The maths behind group showers," Nature News, 18 January 2008
• "Alan Alda tackles 'MATH'---and science---in conversation," San Francisco Chronicle, 17 January 2008;
  "Popular science in a cafe scene," Contra Costa Times, 22 January 2008
• "If You Don't Know Your Math, You'll End Up Taking a Bath," Wall Street Journal, 16 January 2008
• "A Mathematical Gem," Science, 18 January 2008;
  "Diamond's chiral chemical cousin," spectroscopyNOW.com, 15 January 2008;
  "Perfect as a Diamond", Research Highlights, Nature Materials volume 7, number 2, 2008.
• "Nerds, geeks, superstars," Sydney Morning Herald, 13 January 2008
• "Small Infinity, Big Infinity," Science News Online, 12 January 2008
• "Mathematician Proposes Another Way of Divvying Up the US House," Nature News, 8 January 2008
• "Zahlen und Formeln sind die heimlichen Herrscher des 21. Jahrhunderts (Numbers and formulas are the secret rulers of the 21st century)", Welt am Sonntag, 6 January 2008
• "Free journal-ranking tool enters citation market," Nature, 3 January 2008
• Math in "The Year in Science 2007," Discover, January 2008
• "Why do strings of holiday lights end up in giant knots?", Popular Science, January 2008
• "Formula For Disaster," WIRED, January 2008

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