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Choosy Eggs May Pick Sperm for Their Genes, Defying Mendel’s Law
...such heterozygote males and females, they found that none of the offspring lacked both copies of DDX1, even though simple Mendelian math would suggest 25 percent of them should. Given...
Bacteria Sacrifice DNA Repair for Better RNA
...directly altering a cell’s enzymatic activity but through a domino effect that leaves other, unrelated proteins unable to function right. Researchers have been doing the math wrong when thinking about...
Physicists Aim to Classify All Possible Phases of Matter
...by quantum field theories — mathematical descriptions that treat the particles’ environments as smooth. “These tensor categories are conjectured to cover all 2-D phases, but there is no mathematical proof...
How Einstein Lost His Bearings, and With Them, General Relativity
By 1913, Albert Einstein had nearly completed general relativity. But a simple mistake set him on a tortured, two-year reconsideration of his theory. Today, mathematicians still grapple with the issues...
The Elusive Calculus of Insects’ Altruism and Kin Selection
...of biology and mathematics at Harvard University. Nowak doesn’t just disagree about whether kin selection and multilevel selection are equivalent; he says that the broad mathematical strokes of using Hamilton’s...
First Big Steps Toward Proving the Unique Games Conjecture
...bold conjecture is helping mathematicians explore the precise limits of computation. Kevin Hong for Quanta Magazine Video produced by the Simons Foundation, with the cooperation of the International Mathematical Union....
The Physics of Glass Opens a Window Into Biology
...to an underlying geometric minimal surface problem. Consider the following math problem: You have to tile space with a certain number of tiles, and each tile has to have the...
Four Is Not Enough
...using only around 800 points), and mathematicians are exploring whether de Grey’s techniques might be extended to get the lower bound to six colors or even seven. But some mathematicians...
Three Major Physics Discoveries and Counting
...in the 1970s, Wu did much of the math and analysis to discern the three “jets” of energy flying away from particle collisions that signaled the existence of gluons —...