Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. Imaginary numbers push the boundaries of calculus and other branches of math. Hill Street Studios/DigitalVision via Getty Images ...

Physicists construct theories to describe nature. Let us explain it through an analogy with something that we can do in our everyday life, like going on a hike in the mountains. To avoid getting lost, ...

Here’s what you’ll learn when you read this story: A team of German physicists has built a fully working version of quantum mechanics that uses only real numbers. Complex numbers, built from a ...

To a nonmathematician, having the letter “i” represent a number that does not quite exist and is “imaginary” can be hard to wrap your head around. If you open your mind to this way of thinking, ...

An international team of researchers shows through a concrete theoretical experiment that the prediction by standard complex quantum theory cannot be expressed by its real counterpart and ratifies its ...