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Article: Closing in on Fermat's last theorem. (Pierre de Fermat)
- Article from:
- Science News
- Article date:
- June 20, 1987
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1987 Science Service, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Closing in on Fermat's last theorem
One of the most famous unsolved problems in mathematicsstarted out as a note scrawled in the margin of a book. Now known as Fermat's last theorem, the problem was first proposed by 17th-century French mathematician Pierre de Fermat. Although he had a wonderful proof for the theorem, Fermat wrote in the book's margin, he didn't have enough room to write it out. After Fermat's death, scholars could find no trace of the proof in any of his papers, and ever since, mathematicians have struggled in vain to solve the problem. Some recent mathematical discoveries, however, have tied Fermat's theorem more closely to modern ...