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Thursday, July 10, 2014

Throwback Fact of the Week - Fermat's Last Theorem - 7/10/14


 "It is impossible for a cube to be the sum of two cubes, a fourth power to be the sum of two fourth powers, or in general for any number that is a power greater than the second to be the sum of two like powers. I have discovered a truly marvelous demonstration of this proposition that this margin is too narrow to contain." - Pierre de Fermat, 1637

Stated formally,  x^n+y^n=z^n,  where x, y, z, and n are non-zero integers has no solutions for n > 2.


This equation, known famously as Fermat's Last Theorem, would remain unproven for over 350 years. Building off centuries of work by mathematicians, the theorem was finally proven by Andrew Wiles in 1994.

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