The hat: first aperiodic monotile
El sombrero: primer monotile aperiódico (problema einstein)
- Date
- 2023 · confidence high
- Place
- Bridlington (England) and Waterloo (Canada)
- Credited to
- David Smith (a hobbyist), Joseph Samuel Myers, Craig Kaplan and Chaim Goodman-Strauss
- People
- 👤 Chaim Goodman-Strauss1967–👤 Craig D. Kaplan👤 David Smith1935–2023👤 Joseph Samuel Myers
- Field
- Knowledge & symbols
What was discovered
A single 13-sided tile that covers the plane only aperiodically, solving the einstein problem open since the 1960s; months later they presented the spectre, which achieves this without reflections. The proof combines combinatorial arguments and computer verification.
Discovered by a hobbyist experimenting with tiling software.
What it led to
- aperiodic tilings
- quasicrystals
- possible applications in materials
Built on
- Penrose tilings (1974)
- Wang and Berger tilings (1966)
- Shechtman's quasicrystals