E8

[Royal]

For more than a century, mathematicians have sought to understand a vast, 248-dimensional entity, known to them only as E8. Finally, in 2007, an international team of mathematicians and computer scientists made use of a supercomputer to tame the intricate beast.

As background consider the Mysterium Cosmographicum (The Sacred Mystery of the Cosmos) of Johannes Kepler (1571 - 1630), who was so enthralled with symmetry that he suggested the entire solar system and planetary orbits would be modeled by Platonic Solids, such as the cube and dodecahedron, nestled in each other forming layers as if in a gigantic crystalline onion. These kinds of symmetries were limited in scope and number; however, symmetries that Kepler could have hardly imagined may indeed rule the universe.

Simpler Lie groups control the shape of electron orbital and symmetries of subatomic quarks. Larger groups, Like E8, may someday hold the key to a unified theory of physics and help scientists understand string theory and gravity.