The Magic Theorem
Now appearing, The Magic Theorem, a greatly expanded, much abridged edition of The Symmetries of Things, written with John H. Conway and Heidi Burgiel, now available for sale. (And at a great price for the
Tubing Sculpture
For a few years, I’ve been playing with tubing sculptures, like these, with the aim of illustrating symmetries of the hypersphere, described in the final chapter of The Symmetries of Things. Here are some in
Gyring Gyroid
Gyring Gyroid (w Eugene Sargent, 2012, in honor of Tom Rodgers) This piece of samurai space insect armor shows a particular mathematical surface, the gyroid, that naturally arises in many forms. Discovered by Alan Schoen,
A Woven Klein Quartic
Curvature is determined by local geometry, and this can be controlled. A pattern with a particular symmetry is often in an infinite family of patterns, all with the same underlying motif, but of varied curvature
The Golden Hexagon Hat Tiling Substitution Rules
Inspired by the new substitution rules that Shigeki Akiyama and Yoshiaki Araki propose (along with a new proof of aperiodicity!), here are some drawings from the last few days. These aren’t quite the same as
The Pinwheel Tiling
Sometime around 1991, Charles Radin commissioned John Conway for a substitution tiling for which the tiles appeared in infinitely many orientations, and soon John obliged with the Pinwheel. The Pinwheel is formed from right triangles,
The Math Factor
In the fall of 2003 (as a strategic move to have the department seem more community minded) I began putting a weekly puzzle problem on the University of Arkansas campus wide listserv. This caught the