Derrick Corson Niederman is an

author An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states: "''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...

game designer Game design is the art of applying design and aesthetics to create a game for entertainment or for educational, exercise, or experimental purposes. Increasingly, elements and principles of game design are also applied to other interactions, in ...

, and national squash champion. His most recent game, 36 Cube, has been described by

Reuters Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters Corporation. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world. The agency was est ...

as "a wolf in sheep's clothing"Reuters
/ref> because its simple design belies the sophisticated mathematical intuition required for the solution. He received a B.A. in mathematics from

Yale Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...

and a Ph.D. in mathematics from

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

. Dr. Niederman is a math professor at the

College of Charleston The College of Charleston (CofC or Charleston) is a public university in Charleston, South Carolina. Founded in 1770 and chartered in 1785, it is the oldest university in South Carolina, the 13th oldest institution of higher learning in the Uni ...

Published games

''The New York Times Magazine'' Sunday Crosswords Niederman has created a number of crossword puzzles and cryptic puzzles for ''

The New York Times Magazine ''The New York Times Magazine'' is an American Sunday magazine supplement included with the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times''. It features articles longer than those typically in the newspaper and has attracted many notable contributors. ...

'' since the early 1980s. His October 5, 1997 crossword puzzle "Baseball by the Numbers" is often included in crossword puzzle anthologies. Puzzle and Game Books Dr. Niederman has also published other game and puzzle books. * ''The Puzzler's Dilemma'' (2012) * ''Math Puzzles for the Clever Mind'' (2006) * ''Hard to Solve Math Puzzles'' (2006) * ''Classic Brain Twisters'' (2005) * ''Mind-Stretching Math Puzzles'' (2005) * ''Sit & Solve Brainteasers'' (2003) * ''Hard-to-Solve Math Puzzles'' (2001) * ''Giant Book of Whodunit Puzzles and Giant Book of Puzzles for Young Einsteins'' (2001) * ''Pocket Puzzlers: Whodunits'' (2000) * ''The Little Giant Book of Math Puzzles'' (2000) 36 Cube The 36 Cube is a puzzle that requires the arrangement of "towers" in a 6x6 square block so that each color appears only once in each row and column, all the same height. The completed puzzle will then be a cube.

Jerry Slocum Jerry Slocum is an American historian, collector and author specializing on the field of mechanical puzzles. He worked as an engineer at Hughes Aircraft prior to retiring and dedicating his life to puzzles. His personal puzzle collection, numb ...

, a puzzle historian and one of the world's top puzzle collectors, finds 36 Cube one of the most engaging puzzles in his extensive collection. "My first impression was that it was quite a beautiful puzzle. Its three-dimensional character and colors are very striking. Out of the 30,000 puzzles I own, it's quite distinctive and unique." Dr. Niederman came up with the idea while writing a book on whole numbers, after unearthing a mathematical supposition from the 18th century. "It struck me as the basis for a potentially great 3-D puzzle, and what eventually became 36 Cube."

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Niederman, Derrick Living people American male non-fiction writers American non-fiction writers American male squash players 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians Puzzle designers Year of birth missing (living people) Yale University alumni Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni