Catch the Moment

A fractal is a pattern that laws of nature repeat at different scales. Examples are everywhere in the forest. Trees are natural fractals, patterns that repeat smaller and smaller copies of themselves to create the biodiversity of a forest. Fractals are a never-ending pattern. A fractal is infinitely complex. A fractal is “a rough or fragmented geometric shape that splits into parts, each of which is (at least approximately) a reduced-size copy of the whole,” a property called self-similarity. We construct a self-similar structure by repeating a simple process over and over across different scales in an ongoing feedback loop. Driven by recursion, fractals are images of dynamic systems. The Most Famous Fractal by John Briggs, the Mandelbrot Fractal, mainly because of its haunting beauty, has become the most famous set in modern mathematics. 

Fractals in the Body

Not only are fractals in the world all around us – they are even INSIDE us. Many of our internal organs and structures display fractal properties. MIT, Harvard, and UMass Medical School researchers have shown DNA to be a fractal globule that resists knotting, and allows DNA regions on a chromosome to remain near each other in the 3D structure. Scientists have long known the arrangement of DNA is in a double helix. Driven by recursion, fractals are images of dynamic systems, the pictures of Chaos. It is the geometry of deterministic Chaos and can also describe the geometry of mountains, clouds, and galaxies. Although not widely known, the essential traits of a fractal can apply to all aspects of life because life exists as a fractal abstraction—a never-ending, repeating loop.

WE&P by: EZorrilla.