Mathematical Digest
Short Summaries of Articles about Mathematics
in the Popular Press
"A Regal Bearing," by JR Minkel. Scientific American, April 2004,page 34.
This short piece summarizes work by physicist Hans J. Herrmann of theUniversity of Stuttgart on a space-filling arrangement of bearings. InHerrmann's arrangement, larger bearings are placed at the six vertices of aregular octahedron, with smaller spheres arranged in a fractal pattern. Theresearch is published in "Space-Filling Bearings in Three Dimensions" in the 30January issue of Physical ReviewLetters.
--- Mike Breen
