Math Breakthrough To Be Tested In Berkeley

Aug. 24 - KGO (KGO) -- This story is not for the math impaired. The worlds brightest mathematicians are about to converge on the Bay Area to verify a mathematics breakthrough. A numbers mystery that may have been just been cracked.

The Mathematical Science Research Institute is the largest research center in the world for mathematics. So we decided to come here to understand the mathematical break through and it's significance.

The 'poincare conjecture' it's a math problem the world's greatest minds have been tackling for more than a century. It's the belief that any object that could possibly be a sphere is a sphere.

And now the exclusive international mathematics community is buzzing over a reclusive Russian, named Grigori Perelman, who appears to have proven the 'poincare conjecture'.

Dr. David Eisenbud, Director, Mathematical Sciences Research Inst. "You take one kind of shape and you slowly transform is by this magic of differential equations."

Next week, the top mathematicians of the world will gather, here in Berkeley, at the mathematical sciences research institute to test and expand what is now 'Perelman's Theorum'.

Mathematicians are ecstatic, but what does this mean for the average joe?

Dr. Andrejs Treibergs, University of Utah: "Everything is interconnected. Being able to solve this problem means there's ways now to solve other problems that might be more applicable. "

Mathematicians point to Einstein's "theory of relativity" which explains space on a cosmic scale. It led to the development of nuclear power that much of the world relies upon, as well as the destructive force of nuclear weapons. Throughout the history of mathematics these discoveries open doors to other discoveries that lead to technological advances.

Dr. Andrejs Treibergs, University of Utah: "It will be up to people to control it and use it for the right things."

We are told that mathematicians can turn a numerical discussion into a full contact sport. Where there is a lot of disagreement there's ego, there's passion and a lot of genius all clashing together in one big lecture hall.

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