The Largest Known Prime by Year: A Brief History

http://primes.utm.edu/notes/by_year.html

by vgnet • 14 years ago

71 21 14 years ago

primes.utm.edu

jakejake• 14 years ago

I wonder how long it would take running the prime number shitting bear to discover a new prime...? http://alpha61.com/primenumbershittingbear/

eru4• 14 years ago

What do you mean by `new'? A prime that hasn't been seen by any human? Or a new largest prime?

pavel_lishin• 14 years ago

I imagine you'd hit the integer limit, first.

tantalor2• 14 years ago

We haven't seen a prime larger than M43112609 since 2008. What gives?

This page claims to have been last updated 21 April 2012, http://primes.utm.edu/largest.html

Jimmie• 14 years ago

As tectonic links, Wolfram Alpha gives the same result.

I'm not sure why we haven't found any more lately though, but the information seems to be correct.

The wikipedia page is interesting. We have discovered new large primes since 2008, they just haven't been bigger.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Largest_known_prime_number

tantalor2• 14 years ago

tectonic• 14 years ago

WolframAlpha: http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=largest+known+prime

Estragon2• 14 years ago

  > ...this record, which stood for 75 years, MAY stand
  > forever as the largest prime found by hand calculations.

I shudder to imagine the holocaust which would have to happen before this record could be broken. Though I suppose we may find an alien species who might have found a larger prime "by hand."

rwmj2• 14 years ago

It could happen (without catastrophe/aliens) if: (a) someone discovered a pattern like the Mersenne numbers which unreliably produces primes that are much larger than Mersenne numbers, and (b) someone discovers, by hand, a proof that one of these new numbers is prime. Such a discovery would be wonderful: new mathematics that could give us insight into what primes really are.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Mersenne_number might be one place to start.

pestaa2• 14 years ago

I'd like to understand why primes are believed to be really something, can you please elaborate?

padobson• 14 years ago

I don't want to rain on anyone's math geek parade, but is there a practical use for discovering primes?

Is there any use beyond crunching giant numbers for theoretical physics and knowing a certain number can't be divided - or is this just the math geek equivalent of knowing the Baltimore Orioles had four 20-game winners in 1971?

rwmj2• 14 years ago

It would certainly be nice if someone improved on the Lucas-Lehmer test, or if someone found another "pattern" that unreliably produces primes like the Mersenne numbers. So in some sense, this search encourages both of those things, although regrettably it's not been enough encouragement for a discovery to be made :-(

vgnet• 14 years ago

There might be, but yeah, that's not the main reason for searching IMO.

See http://primes.utm.edu/notes/faq/why.html, but it boils down to "something really interesting can be found along the way, primes relate to other important topics so learning about them has intrinsic value, there's some money in it (but you have a 99.9% chance of spending more than the prizes in your search... and you still won't win)".

AlexFromBelgium• 14 years ago

"Public key crypto algorithms utilize prime numbers extensively; indeed, prime numbers are an essential part of the major public key systems" http://www.sans.org/reading_room/whitepapers/vpns/prime-numb...

andrewcooke• 14 years ago

but they cannot use "biggest" primes because, typically, security relies on the prime being unknown.

The Largest Known Prime by Year: A Brief History

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