Plus, a brain implant gets commercial approval. ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
March 13, 2026—The health benefits of stress resilience for caregivers, a brain implant approved for commercial use and a Pi Day celebration. —Emma Gometz, Newsletter Editor | | Juan Gaertner/Science Photo Library/Getty Images | | These three techniques will let you estimate pi out of randomness. Jonathan Mauer/Getty Images | | Pi Far and Wide Anywhere a circle is to be found, you can also find pi. But sometimes, secret circles and angles can hide in unexpected places, like in a series of random coin flips or sticks thrown on the floor. To celebrate Pi Day tomorrow, we put together some fun ways you can estimate pi using random chance! - Dots in a square: Place a circle exactly within a square, so that its radius is half the value of the length of one of the square's sides. Then, if you add more and more random points inside the square, the proportion of points which end up in the circle will approach π/4.
- Sticks on the floor: Take a pile of needles and drop them on a hardwood floor whose lines are spaced a needle's length apart. The number of times the needles will fall across these lines between the wood planks will be about 2/π.
- Coin flips: Flip a coin. Repeat until you get one more head than tails, then stop and count the proportion of heads. If you repeat this many times and average the results, as the number of flips grows closer to infinity, the result will approach π/4.
What the experts say: The first example, dots in a square, has a pretty obvious connection to circles and pi. But mathematicians are still unclear on why the coin flip example ends up being a way to estimate pi. They just know that it works. "It's very mysterious," says mathematician Stefan Gerhold. "I don't think there is a good way to understand that [in this scenario] the expectation will involve pi." | | Roughly one in five American adults cares for a chronically ill or disabled loved one. It's fulfilling and voluntary work, but the exhaustion from it can mean these caretakers are particularly vulnerable to adverse health outcomes. However, doctors are developing new ways to help caretakers build resilience. How it happens: Studies show caregiving coincides with increased signs of aging. For example, caregiving can increase inflammation that contributes to age-related bodily damage, slow the enzyme activity that protects the telomeres on chromosomes and can be associated with fewer naive T cells in the immune system. The root cause of these aging effects, research shows, is chronic stress. What the experts say: While caregiving can be a strain, it does not mean caregivers will always have worse mental and physical health. Interventions, like brain training or helping caregivers lower their burdens, really can make a difference. "If we can increase the capacity for stress adaptation in these caregivers, that's going to lead to better outcomes and to better quality of life [for them]," says social psychologist Kathi Heffner, associate chief of research in the geriatrics and aging division of the University of Rochester Medical Center. | | | | |
A special event for Scientific American subscribers | | Adults often worry about "kids these days." Parents fear the effects of screen time and social media, and news headlines decry the falling attention spans of youth today. But according to research, kids are doing better than we think. Younger generations show more empathy, willpower, open-mindedness and other positive traits than earlier generations, and youth drug use, violence and teen pregnancies are down. Join three Scientific American editors and parents for a frank discussion of the latest research around parenting and childhood. | | | | |
How well did you read Scientific American this week? Test your knowledge with today's science quiz. Also, check out today's Spellements. If you spot any missing science terms from the puzzle, email them to games@sciam.com. This week, readers found primon, spinor, cavitate, evert, and vitiate. | | MOST POPULAR STORIES OF THE WEEK | | - The reason the Middle East has so much oil is the same reason it's all stuck there now | 4 min read
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| | I've been celebrating Pi Day since I was old enough to calculate pi, but I must admit sometimes pi's constant nature means I forget that new and interesting things are happening with it all the time. It's really cool to be reminded of the mathematicians who are puzzling over the ways pi appears in our world—and finding genuinely surprising results. | | Please send any cool ideas, comments or feedback on this newsletter to: newsletters@sciam.com. See you next week! —Emma Gometz, Newsletter Editor
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