Mysterious pattern in laws of nature

Welcome once more to New Scientist’s weekly round-up of the best stories in science and technology. It’s a mysterious edition this week, with lots of puzzles leaving researchers scratching their heads.

The laws of physics appear to follow a mysterious mathematical pattern

This intriguing story is about what happens when you treat the equations of physics like a language. By following a form of analysis pioneered by linguists, researchers have found that the laws of nature appear to follow a so-far unexplained pattern . It could be telling us something deep about the universe – or reveal how our brains make sense of the cosmos.

The mystery of the missing La Ni?a continues – and we don't know why

The global climate has been doing strange things all year, and the absence of a predicted shift to the cooling La Ni?a pattern is one of the big puzzles forecasters are wrestling with. We’re now expecting a weak event to appear by the end of November , and its cooling influence will be limited.

Meta AI tackles maths problems that stumped humans for over a century

Like many professions, mathematicians are exploring how artificial intelligence might change the way they work. Now Meta, the parent company of Facebook, has got on board with an AI that is able to identify Lyapunov functions , a type of mathematical tool that humans have been wrestling with since 1892.

More from New Scientist

• Speaking of maths, we have a new largest known prime number
• Our magazine cover story this week looks at the ongoing mysteries surrounding Stephen Hawking’s black hole paradox
• Want to brush up on your quantum physics? Sign up for our event in London next month

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Jacob Aron, News Editor