Real and imaginary: The time-dependent Schrödinger equation formulated using complex numbers. (Courtesy: iStock/piranka) Complex numbers are essential to achieve the most accurate quantum-mechanical ...

A forgotten number system invented in the 19th century may provide the simplest explanation for why our universe could have 10 dimensions As children, we all learn about numbers. We start with ...

Complex numbers seem to have an almost mystical aura surrounding them. Perhaps it’s because of the terminology used for them – for example, they have a ‘real part’ and an ‘imaginary part’, and they ...

Several years ago one of us, Toni, asked another of us, Marco, to come to his office at the Institute of Photonic Sciences, a large research center in Castelldefels near Barcelona. “There is a problem ...

Have you ever sat in a math classroom and wondered, “When will I ever use this?” You might have asked yourself this question when you first encountered “imaginary” numbers, and with good reason: What ...

Our February Insights puzzle sent readers on a treasure hunt based on complex numbers. First we provided a bit of a primer, demonstrating that complex numbers (expressions of the form a + bi, where ...