Student's Photos Align Nature and Math

March 1, 2010

There is beauty and order in nature and in mathematics—and Nikki Graziano's photographs prove it.

Graziano's photographs, which she calls "Found Functions" (gallery here), show the harmony of nature around us and the harmony of mathematics within it. A mathematician, photographer, and nature lover, Graziano (Rochester Institute of Technology) extracts organically occurring functions through her photos of the natural world.

“I wanted to create something that could communicate how awesome math is,” Graziano said.

She overlays graphs and their corresponding equations onto her carefully composed images. In one image, for example, a trigonometry function produces an ever-repeating wave of peaks and valleys that mirrors the natural curves in plants.

Source:  Wired Magazine (January 25, 2010)