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| Photo: Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne |
Minecraft is a sandbox video game released in 2011, where the gamer can build almost anything, from simple houses to complex calculators, using only cubes and fluids. These countless possibilities are what lured David Strütt into Minecraft's universe: "the game might be first intended for kids but I was studying for my Bachelor's degree in mathematics when I discovered it. I fell in love with the game when I realized there is all the necessary blocks to build a Turing machine inside the game. It was a long time ago, so I have since forgotten what a Turing machine is. But the gist of it is: anything is possible inside the game."
Matheminecraft, now freely available to everyone, is a video game around Eulerian graphs with a tutorial and four levels. The project was made for the Maths Outreach team with the idea that it should be ready for the EPFL Open days in September 2019. After the success encountered at the Open Days, it was decided that the game will be proposed to classes of the region as a series of ateliers organized by the Maths Outreach Team and the Science Outreach Departement (SPS). During 4 weeks, 36 classes of children—8 to 10 years old– registered to visit EPFL and took part in a two hours matinée where they played Matheminecraft and did various chemistry experiments. Minecraft is a very popular game and has been described as one of the greatest games of all time. Children immediately recognize the game and a growing roar of "are we going to play Minecraft" fills the air as they enter the room. "I think Minecraft digitally plays the same role LEGO did in my childhood. It appeals to anyone who takes a bit of their time to dive into it," speculates David...
Graph theory
The mathematical theory behind the game is vast and well known. It's graph theory and was first mentioned as such in 1736 by Leonhard Euler. Euler laid the foundations of graph theory in his paper about the Seven Bridges of Königsberg (now Kaliningrad in Russia). This is a famous problem related to the urban geography of the city: can we found a walk through the city that would cross each bridge once and only once.
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Source: Phys.org