Imaginary Numbers May Be Essential for Describing Reality A new thought experiment indicates that quantum mechanics doesn’t work without strange numbers that turn negative when squared.

Amid the chaos of revolutionary France, one man’s mathematical obsession gave way to a calculation that now underpins much of ...

There has long been a mystery when calculating how an incoming light wave scatters off an object and becomes a modified, ...

Imaginary numbers may seem abstract or even whimsical at first, but they are far from being mere mathematical curiosities. In fact, they are a natural extension of our number system, leading to a ...

The imaginary numbers weren't describing some bizarre microwave daydream, but rather a tiny shift in the carrier wave's frequency as it passes through a material thanks to the way the transmitted ...

Imaginary numbers, also called complex numbers, are used in real-life applications, such as electricity, as well as quadratic equations.

Imaginary numbers might seem like unicorns and goblins — interesting but irrelevant to reality. But for describing matter at its roots, imaginary numbers turn out to be essential. They seem to ...

The Imaginary Number Simon Singh's Numbers Five Numbers The imaginary number takes mathematics to another dimension. If the square root of +1 is both +1 and -1, then what is the square root of -1?