About 30 years ago, Benoît Mandelbrot, working at IBM Research, developed a new branch of mathematics called fractals. Few people realize how much fractals have changed our world. In addition to the beautiful graphs created with fractal number sets, we have much smaller and more versatile cell phones thanks to fractal antennas. They make it possible for one small antenna to receive the wide variety of frequencies needed to operate in any country of the world and to receive GPS signals at the same time. Fractal mathematics has lead to much stronger concrete, to fractal landscapes in art and films like Star Trek II, and much, much more.
Last month, Nova broadcast an excellent documentary on fractals. Hunting the Hidden Dimension is available for viewing on their web site. I highly recommend it.
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