Expo 2020 Dubai: Why Hamilton's equation is on the Ireland Pavilion facade

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Expo 2020 Dubai: Why Hamilton's equation is on the Ireland Pavilion facade

Ireland shows its mobility prowess through the sun and a 19th-century equation of rotation

Published: July 06, 2021 18:02 Last updated: September 05, 2021 19:11 Sahar Ejaz, Staff Writer

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ireland pavilion expo 2020 — Under the sub-theme of Mobility, the Ireland Pavilion is honouring its past discoveries and ingenuity, tracing the innovative spirit of the Irish people all the way back to 5,000 years ago. Be it the principles of motion in physics or the sun's path across the sky, something unique is always born out of the well of Irish creativity. And now, come October, curious eyes and minds can see it all reflect in the country's pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai. Image Credit: Expo 2020 Dubai

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sir william rowan hamilton — Dublin-born mathematician Sir William Rowand Hamilton had his own 'eureka' moment on the way to a Royal Irish Academy meeting in 1843. He had been troubled with the two-dimensional computation of complex numbers (a composition of real numbers such as 1, 2, 3 and numbers that have imaginary units such as 2i). Hamilton's use of triples proved difficult for charting in a three-dimensional space before he upended the rules of algebra and discovered quaternions. Image Credit: Shutterstock

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hamilton quaternions bridge — ‘i2=j2=k2=ijk=−1’ was what a thrilled Hamilton carved into the stone of the Broom Bridge (then the Brougham Bridge) as Helen Maria Bayly, Hamilton's wife, watched from the sidelines on October 16, 1843. In introducing a fourth dimension, the 19th-century mathematician described the geometry of vectors in a 3D space through quaternions, which are quadruples of real numbers. His unconventional discovery that bent the laws of ordinary arithmetic and would go on to revolutionise quantum mechanics, robotics, navigation and animation was commemorated on the same bridge by the Royal Irish Academy in 1958. Image Credit: Cone83/Wikimedia Commons

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newgrange_ireland — The pavilion's oculus takes inspiration from a passage tomb in Ireland called the Newgrange, built by prehistoric farmers on an area of one acre. What the structure mimics is the rectangular opening above the tomb's entrance, through which sunlight would pour in every winter solstice in December to symbolise the prevalence of life over death. Image Credit: Shutterstock

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