Wednesday, December 19, 2012

 

Squoval



Squoval is a portmanteau of the terms and shapes "square" and "oval." The word can refer to the not quite oval, not quite square shape of a fingernail or toenail.  "Essentially a conservative square with the length of a square nail but the softer edges of an oval" the term was coined to refer to fingernail shape in 1984 by Paula Gilmore, a prominent stylist and educator, according to Peters.  This style was popular in the 1990s, and is still a popular natural nail shape. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squoval 

Saturday, December 08, 2012

 

Water Retention on Mathematical Surfaces


This article concerns the mathematical problem of finding the maximum retention of water on various surfaces. Imagine a surface of cells of various heights on a regular array such as a square lattice, and water is rained down on every cell in the system. The boundaries of the system are open and allow water to flow out. Water will be trapped in ponds, and eventually all ponds will fill to their maximum height, with any additional water flowing over spillways and out the boundaries of the system. The problem is to find the amount of water trapped or retained for a given surface.

This has been studied extensively for two mathematical surfaces: (1) Magic Square and (2) Random Surfaces (discussed in this entry). In 2010, water retention on magic squares was used as a challenge in Al Zimmermann contest: find the L x L magic square with the maximum water retention. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Water retention on mathematical surfaces". This entry is a fragment of a larger work. Link may die if entry is finally removed or merged.

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