Latest news from Plus magazine! - http://plus.maths.org

In this newsletter:

- Latest news
- Browse with Plus
- Mathematical moments
- Work with maths

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Latest news from Plus

News just in... -  Get Plus headlines delivered straight to your
computer or publish them on your website!
http://plus.maths.org/latestnews/may-aug04/rss/index.html

Virtually reducing the 3D load -  Digital weight loss for Shrek and
his virtual 3D buddies!
http://plus.maths.org/latestnews/may-aug04/mesh/index.html


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Browse with Plus

The Chaos Hypertextbook - This is a great site that explores and
explains the mathematics behind chaos theory in an accessible and
humorous way.  Plus particularly liked the analogy between puff
pastry and the Lorenz attractor, and the description of mathematics
being fortified by its study of monster curves - "Whatever doesn't
kill you only makes you stronger"!  There is a comprehensive
bibliography of print, software and internet resources, and a
beautiful gallery of "Eye Candy".  This site successfully conveys the
author's passion for the area, and aims for an audience of people who,
like him, may not be mathematicians but enjoy maths as a diversion.

http://hypertextbook.com/chaos/

More on chaos theory and fractals:
http://plus.maths.org/indices/topic_urls.html#CHAOS%20THEORY
http://plus.maths.org/indices/keyword_urls.html#CHAOS
http://plus.maths.org/indices/keyword_urls.html#FRACTAL


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Mathematical moments

Julia Hall Bowman Robinson - Born 8 Dec 1919, Died 30 Jul 1985, USA.
Despite a difficult childhood, losing both her parents and a long
period of illness, Robinson went on to excel in mathematics at a time
when it was an unusual subject for a woman to study.  By the end of
her schooling she was the only girl in her maths class, and in the
1940s she had to stop teaching at Berkeley as they didn't allow a
woman to teach in the same department as her husband.  Robinson
produced important work on game theory and decidability, and her work
on Hilbert's Tenth Problem contributed significantly to its solution.

Although achieving many "firsts", such as being the first woman
president of the American Mathematical Society in 1982, she hoped to
be remembered for her mathematics rather than personal
achievements. She thought of mathematicians as "forming a nation of
our own without distinctions of geographical origins, race, creed,
sex, age, or even time ... all dedicated to the most beautiful of the
arts and sciences".

Read more about Julia Bowman Robinson ...

from the MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive:
http://turnbull.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/history/Mathematicians/Robinson_Julia.html

from her sister:
http://www.ams.org/notices/199612/reid.pdf

and about the Hilbert Problems and game theory from Plus:
http://plus.maths.org/issue25/features/budd/index.html
http://plus.maths.org/indices/topic_urls.html#GAME%20THEORY

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Work with maths

Would you like to work with the Millennium Mathematics Project, the
organisation that produces Plus?

The Millennium Mathematics Project has agreed with Simon Singh to take
on the running of the Enigma Schools Project from September 2004. We
are therefore looking for a maths or science graduate with very strong
communication and teaching skills and a demonstrable interest in
education and the popular communication of maths and science to take
the Enigma Project to primary and secondary schools, demonstrate a
real WWII Enigma machine, give talks and run hands-on workshops based
around codes and the history of mathematics and codebreaking.

For full information including a job description and details of how to
apply see http://www.mmp.maths.org/jobs/first.html


Happy reading from the Plus team!

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