Math Concepts
Math is often called the universal language because no matter where you're from, a better understanding of math means a better understanding of the world around you. Learn about math concepts such as addition, subtraction, fractions, ratios and more.
Brown Noise vs. White Noise: Which Is Best for Quality Sleep?
Can a sound wave kill you?
Can two cans and a string really be used to talk over a distance?
Delta-8 vs. Delta-9: Comparing Types of THC
Strong Bases: Properties, Applications and Examples
Comparing Strong Acids and Weak Acids
How Electricity Works
How Faraday Cages Work
How Gasoline Works
What do bugs have to do with forensic science?
5 Things You Didn't Know About Autopsies
Do a Person’s Fingerprints Change After Death?
How Alchemy Paved the Way for Chemistry
How did Nikola Tesla change the way we use energy?
Time May Not Exist, Say Some Physicists and Philosophers
Why Does Ice Stick to Your Fingers?
What if I forgot to remove a piercing before an MRI?
A Kid-friendly Introduction to Magnets and Magnetism
5 Hugely Fun Facts About Mass (Not Weight)
Antarctica's Spooky Cosmic Rays Might Shatter Physics As We Know It
Entropy: The Invisible Force That Brings Disorder to the Universe
The Demon Core: A Tale of Atomic Ambition and Tragic Fate
Half-Life Formula: Components and Applications
Could an 'X17 Particle' Hint at a Fifth Force in the Universe?
Why Are School Buses Yellow?
HowStuffWorks: How To Draw An Impossible Shape
What Are the Colors in the Visible Spectrum?
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Dividing fractions is easy once you learn a couple of rules and remember three words — keep, change and flip.
A perfect square is a number, but it can also be explained using an actual square.
The Fibonacci sequence has been a numerical sequence for millennia. But what does it have to do with sunflower seeds or rabbits?
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Whether the circle is as big as planet Mars or as small as a tennis ball, the ratio of its circumference divided by its diameter will always equal pi (3.14). But why?
Has this ever happened to you? The meteorologist calls for a massive snowstorm, but the flakes fail to arrive. Chaos theory can shed light on why forecasts fail (and why our orderly world may not be so orderly after all).
You use the number zero all the time, but it may surprise you to learn that it sometimes isn't a number at all. It may surprise you even more to learn that it was all but invented. See what else surprises you about zero in this article.
By Josh Clark
Two mathematicians have solved a decades-old math problem by harnessing the power of a virtual supercomputer.
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The Pythagorean theorem, which explains how to calculate the longest side of a right-angled triangle, is an ancient mathematical statement that still buttresses modern-day construction, aviation and even how we navigate through traffic.
And it'll take XIV minutes flat.
By Alia Hoyt & Desiree Bowie
How do you calculate absurdly high numbers without writing them out in numerals? You use scientific notation. We'll give you examples and show you how.
By Mark Mancini & Yara Simón
A dodecahedron has 12 flat faces, all shaped like pentagons. Here are 12 cool things you just may not know about them.
By Mark Mancini
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Corresponding angles are what you get when two parallel lines are crossed by a third line, creating angles that have the same relative position at each intersection. They're easy to find once you know what to look for.
We may think the butterfly effect means that a small change (like the flap of a butterfly's wings) can have huge consequences (a tornado in China). But what if it means the opposite?
Venn diagrams are an easy way to simplify information and visualize relationships between concepts or sets of data.
It's easy to make a Mobius strip with some paper and tape, but your mind will be blown by the mathematical concepts it unlocks.
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Two lines that are perpendicular to the same line are parallel to each other and will never intersect.
By Mark Mancini
A reinterpretation of an ancient Babylonian tablet shows that trigonometry might be 1,000 years older than thought. But there's some disagreement.
Mathematics achieves the sublime. Sometimes, as with tessellations, it rises to art. In their simplest form, tessellations consist of a single shape that repeats over a two-dimensional plane without any gaps. Why was M.C. Escher so fixated on them?
Fractals have been around forever but were only defined in the last quarter of the 20th century. Think you can wrap your brain around how fractals work?
By Craig Haggit & Yara Simón
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A world without math is unimaginable. It's a part of who we are. It's the analytical juice of our left brain. In the words of physicist Richard Feynman, even a fool can use it. So why do so many of us turn our backs on numbers?
By Robert Lamb
For many of us, a number is just a number, a bit of information that tells you, say, what time it is. But mathematicians look at that same number and divine relationships that underlie nature itself. Ready to enter the trippy world of number theory?
By Robert Lamb
An imaginary number is a value that's the square root of a negative number. It can't exist on a one-dimensional number line. We'll explain.
Can you name even one female mathematician? Don't worry if you can't. That just means you need to read our article on five famous female mathematicians to up your cred.
By Dave Roos
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Mathematician Andrew Booker has found the three cubes that add up to the number 33, a long-unsolved math problem.
You've heard of Google, but what about a Googol? If not, then this tutorial is for you.
By Mark Mancini