Chaim Goodman-Strauss (born June 22, 1967 in Austin, Texas) is an American mathematician who works in convex geometry, especially

aperiodic tiling An aperiodic tiling is a non-periodic Tessellation, tiling with the additional property that it does not contain arbitrarily large periodic regions or patches. A set of tile-types (or prototiles) is aperiodic set of prototiles, aperiodic if copie ...

. He retired from the faculty of the

University of Arkansas The University of Arkansas (U of A, UArk, or UA) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Fayetteville, Arkansas, United States. It is the Flagship campus, flagship campus of the University of Arkan ...

and currently serves as outreach mathematician for the National Museum of Mathematics. He is co-author with John H. Conway and Heidi Burgiel of '' The Symmetries of Things'', a comprehensive book surveying the mathematical theory of patterns.

Education and career

Goodman-Strauss received both his B.S. (1988) and Ph.D. (1994) in mathematics from the

University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public university, public research university in Austin, Texas, United States. Founded in 1883, it is the flagship institution of the University of Texas System. With 53,082 stud ...

.Chaim Goodman-Strauss
The College Board His doctoral advisor was John Edwin Luecke. He joined the faculty at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville (UA) in 1994 and served as departmental chair from 2008 to 2015. He held visiting positions at the

National Autonomous University of Mexico The National Autonomous University of Mexico (, UNAM) is a public university, public research university in Mexico. It has several campuses in Mexico City, and many others in various locations across Mexico, as well as a presence in nine countri ...

and

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

. During 1995 he did research at

The Geometry Center The Geometry Center was a mathematics research and education center at the University of Minnesota. It was established by the National Science Foundation in the late 1980s and closed in 1998. The focus of the center's work was the use of computer ...

, a mathematics research and education center at the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...

, where he investigated aperiodic tilings of the plane. Goodman-Strauss has been fascinated by patterns and mathematical paradoxes for as long as he can remember. He attended a lecture about the mathematician

Georg Cantor Georg Ferdinand Ludwig Philipp Cantor ( ; ; – 6 January 1918) was a mathematician who played a pivotal role in the creation of set theory, which has become a foundations of mathematics, fundamental theory in mathematics. Cantor establi ...

when he was 17 and says, "I was already doomed to be a mathematician, but that lecture sealed my fate." He became a mathematics writer and popularizer. From 2004 to 2012, in conjunction with KUAF 91.3 FM, the University of Arkansas NPR affiliate, he presented
The Math Factor
" a podcast website dealing with recreational mathematics.The Math Factor Podcast Website
July 24, 2012 He is an admirer of

Martin Gardner Martin Gardner (October 21, 1914May 22, 2010) was an American popular mathematics and popular science writer with interests also encompassing magic, scientific skepticism, micromagic, philosophy, religion, and literatureespecially the writin ...

and is on the advisory council of Gathering 4 Gardner, an organization that celebrates the legacy of the famed mathematics popularizer and

Scientific American ''Scientific American'', informally abbreviated ''SciAm'' or sometimes ''SA'', is an American popular science magazine. Many scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it, with more than 150 Nobel Pri ...

columnist,About The G4G Foundation
Gathering 4 Gardner and is active in the associated Celebration of Mind events. In 2022 Goodman-Strauss was awarded the National Museum of Mathematics
Rosenthal Prize
which recognizes innovation and inspiration in math teaching.

Aperiodic monotiles

On Mar 20, 2023 Strauss, together with David Smith, Joseph Samuel Myers and Craig S. Kaplan, announced the proof that the tile discovered by David Smith is an aperiodic monotile, i.e., a solution to a longstanding open einstein problem. The team continues to refine this work.

Mathematical artist

In 2008 Goodman-Strauss teamed up with J. H. Conway and Heidi Burgiel to write '' The Symmetries of Things'', an exhaustive and reader-accessible overview of the mathematical theory of patterns. He produced hundreds of full-color images for this book using software that he developed for the purpose. The Mathematical Association of America said, "The first thing one notices when one picks up a copy … is that it is a beautiful book … filled with gorgeous color pictures … many of which were generated by Goodman-Strauss. Unlike some books which add in illustrations to keep the reader's attention, the pictures are genuinely essential to the topic of this book."Review of ''The symmetries of things''
by Darren Glass,

The Mathematical Association of America The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) is a professional society that focuses on mathematics accessible at the undergraduate level. Members include university, college, and high school teachers; graduate and undergraduate students; pure a ...

, July 10, 2008 He also creates large-scale sculptures inspired by mathematics, and some of these have been featured at Gathering 4 Gardner conferences.The Math Factor Podcast Website
Pictures from the Gathering

Books

* 2008 ''The symmetries of things'' (with by John H. Conway and Heidi Burgiel). A. K. Peters, Wellesley, MA, 2008,

Papers

"Matching Rules and Substitution Tilings"
''

Annals of Mathematics The ''Annals of Mathematics'' is a mathematical journal published every two months by Princeton University and the Institute for Advanced Study. History The journal was established as ''The Analyst'' in 1874 and with Joel E. Hendricks as t ...

'', Second Series, Vol 147, Issue 1 (January 1998), pp. 181–223
"A Small Aperiodic Set of Planar Tiles"
''

European Journal of Combinatorics The ''European Journal of Combinatorics'' is an international peer-reviewed scientific journal that specializes in combinatorics. The journal primarily publishes papers dealing with mathematical structures within combinatorics and/or establishing ...

'', Vol 20, Issue 5, (July 1999) pp. 375–384
"Compass and Straightedge in the Poincaré Disk"
''

American Mathematical Monthly ''The American Mathematical Monthly'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal of mathematics. It was established by Benjamin Finkel in 1894 and is published by Taylor & Francis on behalf of the Mathematical Association of America. It is an exposi ...

'' Vol. 108 (January 2001), pp. 38–49
"Can’t Decide? Undecide!"
''

Notices of the American Mathematical Society ''Notices of the American Mathematical Society'' is the membership journal of the American Mathematical Society (AMS), published monthly except for the combined June/July issue. The first volume was published in 1953. Each issue of the magazine ...

'' Vol. 57 (March 2010), pp. 343–356
"A strongly aperiodic set of tiles in the hyperbolic plane"
''

Inventiones Mathematicae ''Inventiones Mathematicae'' is a mathematical journal published monthly by Springer Science+Business Media. It was established in 1966 and is regarded as one of the most prestigious mathematics journals in the world. The current (2023) managing ...

'', Vol 159, Issue 1 (2005), pp. 119–132
"Lots of Aperiodic Sets of Tiles"
''

Journal of Combinatorial Theory The ''Journal of Combinatorial Theory'', Series A and Series B, are mathematical journals specializing in combinatorics and related areas. They are published by Elsevier. ''Series A'' is concerned primarily with structures, designs, and applicati ...

, Series A'', Vol 160 (November 2018), pp. 409–445

References

External links

*
Personal web page

"Shaping Surfaces"

ideo IDEO () is a design firm, design and consulting firm with offices in the U.S., England, and China. It was founded in Palo Alto, California, in 1991. The company's 500 staff uses a design thinking approach to design products, services, environmen ...

Address to National Museum of Mathematics (MoMath) on December 3, 2014 {{DEFAULTSORT:Goodman-Strauss, Chaim Mathematics popularizers Recreational mathematicians 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians Academics from Austin, Texas University of Texas at Austin College of Liberal Arts alumni University of Arkansas faculty American geometers Mathematical artists American scientific illustrators Combinatorialists American topologists 1967 births Living people