Before I start on my post, I have an important message to share with you all: my niece, Hazel Anne Rees (pictured), was born today at 3:50pm (New Zealand Daylight Time). This means that I am now an uncle. Now for a second helping of good news: the biggest prime number yet has been discovered. It is indeed massive, more than 17 million digits long.
A text file of the entire number contains more than 22 megabytes of information. For those who have been out of school for a while, let's review: A prime number is a positive integer that cannot be divided evenly by any number except itself and 1. The first 10 prime numbers are 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, 29. There is no clear pattern in these numbers, nor is there an easy formula to calculate the 11th prime number (31). And, as proven 2300 years ago by the great mathematician Euclid, there are an infinite number of primes. I'm sure the next prime is not too far around the corner.
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