Möbius strip
Banda de Möbius
- Date
- 1858 · confidence high
- Place
- Leipzig, Germany
- Credited to
- August Möbius and Johann Benedict Listing (independently)
- Field
- Knowledge & symbols
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What was discovered
Möbius, in Leipzig, and Listing, in Göttingen, independently described a surface with only one side and one edge, made by joining a strip of paper with a half-twist. It was the first celebrated example of a non-orientable surface.
Listing described it a few months before Möbius, in an 1858 manuscript not published until later; the popular name became attached to Möbius.
What it led to
- Study of non-orientable surfaces
- A recurring motif in art, engineering and design (conveyor belts, the recycling symbol)
- A classic teaching example in topology