PATTERNS IN NATURE

Mathematics in Modern World

BAJ1-1D
Acuavera, Ma. Paula
Baldrez, Sharmaine
Melegrito, Joan Marie
Nuqui, Marion Wellesley
Repollo, Zila Amor
Sampang, Dianne Raine
Tangcangco, MAry Roan Joy

Prof. Pamela Bang-As

DEFINITION
What are Patterns?
Everything around us–from the smallest to the gigantic, from the simplest to
the complex–that has sequences and designs that are orderly and that repeat are considered
patterns. It is when a set of numbers, colors, shapes, or sound are repeated over and over again.

Patterns in Nature
Patterns in nature are visible regular forms found in the natural world. The patterns
can sometimes be modeled mathematically and they include symmetries, trees, spirals, waves,
foams, cracks and stripes. Basically, patterns can be found everywhere─even in the solar
system.
Mathematics, physics and chemistry can explain patterns in nature at different levels.
Patterns in living things express the underlying biological processes. Studies of pattern
formation make use of computer models to simulate a wide range of patterns.

Significance of Patterns in Nature

Everyday, we experience sunrise and sunset–patterns which proves that the
Earth rotates around the sun. Patterns help us organize information and make sense of the
world around us.
Aside from that, patterns enable people to do things such as building cities
and arts based on the patterns that can be seen in the nature. Especially, mathematicians,
patterns help them create things that make them need in their field. In fact, mathematicians
have been able to create equations using spiral patterns that explain why the world works the
way it does.
In addition, We have used patterns, like the alphabet and sign language to help us
communicate with one another.
Types of Patterns in Nature

⚫ Tessellations
Tessellations are patterns formed by repeating tiles all over a flat surface.
E.g. Honeycomb

The entire process of creating a honeycomb pattern in a hive, therefore, comes from a
combination of physical laws and bee behavior that takes advantage of these laws. The pattern
of bee behavior is just as important as the pattern of physical laws that is employed to create
the comb structure.
⚫ Symmetry
It is when different sides of something are alike. These reflections may be mirror
images with only two sides, like the two sides of our bodies; they may be symmetrical on
several sides, like the inside of an apple sliced in half; or they might be symmetrical on all
sides, like the different faces of a cube.
E.g. Snowflakes

According to Sue Stossel, scientists study snow crystals to learn more about surface
chemistry, how energy moves, and how other types of crystals are able to self- assemble
complex structures from simple ingredients. Every snow crystal starts as a tiny hexagon. From
there, branches begin to form at each of the six corners, and a crystal’s shape begins to emerge.
Crystals experience a range of differing temperatures and humidity while sailing through the
clouds, each of which contribute to the shape and details of the snow crystals’ six arms.

⚫ Spots, stripes
These patterns have an evolutionary explanation: they have functions which increase
the chances that the offspring of the patterned animal will survive to reproduce.
E.g. Tiger stripes, Hyena’s spots

Tigers, for example, have parallel stripes, evenly spaced and perpendicular to the
spine. These natural patterns essentially emerge when interacting substances create waves of
high and low concentrations of a pigment, chemical, or type of cell, for example.
 ⚫ Spirals
Spirals are another common pattern in nature that we see more often in living things.
A special type of spiral, the logarithmic spiral, is the one that gets smaller as it goes, e.g.,
hurricane, galaxies, seashells.

E.g. Sunflower, Seashells

(Sunflowers)
Mathematical biologists love sunflowers. The giant flowers are one of the most
obvious—as well as the prettiest—demonstrations of a hidden mathematical rule shaping the
patterns of life: the Fibonacci sequence, a set in which each number is the sum of the previous
two (1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233, 377, 610, ...), found in everything from
pineapples to pine cones. In this case, the telltale sign is the number of different seed spirals on
the sunflower's face. Count the clockwise and counterclockwise spirals that reach the outer
edge, and you'll usually find a pair of numbers from the sequence: 34 and 55, or 55 and 89,
or—with very large sunflowers—89 and 144.

(Shells)
As far as the animal that lives in a shell grows it needs the shell to grow in the same proportion,
in order to continue to live inside it. When shells grow they keep always the same shape. This
growth process yields an elegant spiral structure (very visible when the shell is sliced). The
widths of the straight lines that link the shell center (the spiral origin) to the points of the shell
increase, but the amplitudes of the angles defined by those lines and the corresponding tangents
to the shell are constant, that is, shells follow an equiangular spiral.

⚫ Cracks
 Cracks are linear openings that form in materials to relieve stress.

⚫ Trees, fractals
Fractals are infinitely self-similar, iterated mathematical constructs having
fractal dimension. Infinite iteration is not possible in nature so all ‘fractal’ patterns are only
approximate.

Other examples:
 ⚫ Weather Patterns
In concluding about the weather, meteorologists used technologies that depends on
mathematical principles and physics. Meteorologists study the atmosphere. They examine and
attempt to predict the weather and the effects of air pollution, amongst other atmospheric
wonders. They use different instruments to measure the wind speed and direction, temperature,
pressure and humidity for them to have the variables to put into charts, graphs and interpretation
of the weather.

⚫ Human Population
The organisms in a population may be distributed in a uniform, random, or clumped
pattern.
Human Population Through math, we can illustrate the different population dynamics of
countries and world regions while also building students’ computational skills and
understanding of ratios, percentages, logarithmic equations, and modeling. Understanding
birth, death, and fertility rates, growth patterns, probabilities, and projections are all part of
“real-world math”—using relevant data about the world around us to build students’
foundations in mathematical practices and reasoning.
 ⚫ Human Productivity

Connections of Patterns in Nature

Patterns in nature do not stand alone. They thrive because they are part of a
complex web of interrelationships. Any given object or group always has an effect
on something else. A fish is part of a fish school. The fish school is part of an
ecosystem which is part of a food chain that sustains otherwise unrelated species.
Everything is connected. The system of connectivity is a pattern in itself.
Patterns are an outward manifestation of an ordered structure and are clues
as to how things are organized and connected.