20 September 1999 Vol. 4, No. 38
THE MATH FORUM INTERNET NEWS
Fibonacci Series - ThinkQuest 99 | Mathematics Exploration - Space Launches |
Artlandia
THE FIBONACCI SERIES
Anderson, Frazier, Popendorf; ThinkQuest 1999
http://library.advanced.org/27890/
A site for learning about the Fibonacci Series, including
an introduction, the rabbit problem, Binet's formula, the
successor formula (given only one term in the Fibonacci
series, determine the term that directly follows it),
binomial form, and the Fibonacci spiral.
Also see how the Fibonacci Series relates to the golden
ratio; learn about the lives of Fibonacci and other
mathematicians (Edouard Lucas, Jacques Binet, Jordanus
Nemorarius); and explore some applications of the series:
- Fibonacci ratios
- Binet revisited
- one over eighty-nine: the decimal expansion of 1/89
- apartment buildings: why the number of combinations for
each set of a certain group of apartment buildings is
a Fibonacci number
- nature
A quiz is available for each of the four main sections of
the site; an index organizes all of the site's Shockwave
Flash demonstrations; and the authors also provide further
reading and a bibliography.
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MATHEMATICS EXPLORATION I
Capital Community-Technical College
http://cctc.commnet.edu/lta/
PDF files of ten exercises ranging in difficulty from
pre-algebra to college calculus and differential equations,
based on activities that occur routinely in project design
and during space launches:
1) Spare Parts for the Space Shuttle
2) NASA Aquatics Lab
3) The Doppler Radar Wind Profiler: Vector Analysis of
Wind Changes Affecting Shuttle Launch at The Kennedy
Space Center
4) Just Say "No" to Cracks in the Space Shuttle
5) Toxic Waste Remediation at The Kennedy Space Center
6) Surviving in a Lunar Base Station
7) Houston, We Have a Problem! - Curve Fitting for
the Spacelab
8) Space-Age Cleaning
9) Work Sampling at the Kennedy Space Center
10) Exploring NASA's Automated Window Inspection Device
(AWID)
Tables of contents display the exercises by math topic or by
technology. Faculty notes and spinoff activities are included,
and a link is provided for downloading Acrobat Reader,
required to read the PDF files. The project is supported by
NASA, the National Science Foundation, and the American
Association of Mathematics for Two-Year Colleges (AMATYC).
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ARTLANDIA - SOFTWARE FOR PROGRAMMABLE CREATIVE GRAPHIC DESIGN
http://www.artlandia.com/
A Mathematica-based application for artistic interpretation
of data and creating mathematical and algorithmic art.
The software provides a selection of tools for constructing
geometrical objects from numerical arrays, distributing
geometric shapes over the plane, and making and manipulating
lattices and wallpaper patterns, as well as performing
graphics operations and transformations. Algorithms attempt
to balance the perfectly predictable and symmetric with the
creative and random.
The site includes a graphics gallery and display of
user-created art. Artlandia requires Mathematica 3.0 or
higher and is available for all platforms that run
Mathematica. The student version can be purchased at a
discount; see also Artlandia'sinteractive program,
Kaleidoscope.
http://www.artlandia.com/software/kaleidoscope/
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