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Computation & Analysis

Searching Genomes with Mathematica and HadoopLink

Editorial note: This post was written by Paul-Jean Letourneau as a follow-up to his post Mathematica Gets Big Data with HadoopLink. In my previous blog post I described how to write MapReduce algorithms in Mathematica using the HadoopLink package. Now let's go a little deeper and write a more serious MapReduce algorithm. I've blogged in the past about some of the cool genomics features in Wolfram|Alpha. You can even search the human genome for DNA sequences you're interested in. Biologists often need to search for the locations of DNA fragments they find in the lab, in order to know what animal the fragment belongs to, or what chromosome it's from. Let's use HadoopLink to build a genome search engine!
Wolfram Blog Team
Education & Academic

Spellbound Valentines: DIY Art from 3D-Printed Sound

An original gift can make people feel much warmer, especially in the icy weather affecting so many places this winter---including our headquarters. Valentine's Day is a good excuse to get a little creative in the art of gift making. And for me, "getting creative" long ago became synonymous with programing in the Wolfram Language. It is that medium that compels me to treat programming as art, where one can improvise, easily pulling magical rabbits out of a hat. So what shall we make? I think the best gift is a DIY one---especially if it says a lot without even making a sound. Below you see a 3D-printed silver earring in the shape of a sound wave recorded while a person is saying "I love you."
Vitaliy Kaurov, Director of Community Engagement
Education & Academic

Registration Is Open for Mathematica Summer Camp 2014

We are happy to announce the Mathematica Summer Camp 2014! This camp, for advanced high school students entering grades 11 or 12, will be held at Bentley University in Waltham, Massachusetts July 6--18. If you are ready for two weeks of coding fun, apply now on our website. Students who attend the camp have a unique opportunity to work one-on-one with Wolfram mentors in order to build their very own project in Mathematica.
Crystal Fantry, Education Content Manager
Education & Academic

Computer-Based Math Continues to Gain Momentum

The country of Estonia has been racking up the accolades recently, receiving high praise for its stellar PISA scores, and recognition from the BBC News for its progressive, cutting-edge teaching practices. One of the many reasons for this is that Estonian primary schools have long been teaching students as young as seven and eight years old how to build robots, develop QR codes, and write computer programs. They are the pioneers of a growing movement to finally make computer science once again a core subject in K--12 classrooms. Innovative school districts worldwide, including Chicago Public Schools in the US, have recently begun to follow suit, incorporating computer science into the lesson plans of classes as early as primary school.
Wolfram Blog Team
Education & Academic

How to Win at Rock-Paper-Scissors

Rock-paper-scissors* isn't obviously interesting to look at mathematically. The Nash-equilibrium strategy is very simple: choose equally and randomly from the three choices, and (in the long run) your opponent will not beat you (nor will you beat your opponent). Nevertheless, it's still possible for a computer strategy to beat a human player over a long run of games. My nine-year-old daughter showed me one solution with a Scratch program that she wrote that won every time by looking at your choice before making its decision! But I will walk you through a simple solution that wins without cheating.
Jon McLoone, Director, Technical Communication & Strategy
Computation & Analysis

The Wolfram Technology Conference Egg-Bot Challenge Winners

We have a programming competition every year at the Wolfram Technology Conference, which in past years was the Mathematica One-Liner Competition (2010, 2011). This year we held the Egg-Bot Challenge, a change of pace to give attendees a chance to exercise their graphics skills. The idea of the competition was to use Mathematica to generate designs that could be plotted on spheres via Egg-Bots, computer-controlled plotters that draw on eggs, Ping-Pong balls, light bulbs, mini-pumpkins, golf balls... nearly anything spherical or ovoid that is less than four inches in diameter.
Christopher Carlson, Senior User Interface Developer, User Interfaces
Announcements & Events

Read Up on Mathematica in Many Subjects

Researchers and professionals from around the world are frequently using Mathematica to further their fields of study. We like to recognize these published books and papers that incorporate our technologies and catalog them so that you can find resources for using Mathematica in subjects you need. Here are some recent publications:
Wolfram Blog Team
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