Mathematicians were disturbed, centuries ago, to find that calculating the properties of certain curves demanded the seemingly impossible: numbers that, when multiplied by themselves, turn negative.

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, ...

For almost a century, physicists have been intrigued by the fundamental question: why are complex numbers so important in quantum mechanics, that is, numbers containing a component with the imaginary ...

It should be impossible to measure an imaginary number in the lab, but a group of researchers have found a way to do so. They produced the equivalent of a magnetic field of imaginary strength, meaning ...

In the mystic world of quantum physics, a team of Chinese scientists is proving that one of the field’s favourite imaginary tools might not be fanciful after all. Through a series of intricate ...