After 1952: the later development of Alan Turing's ideas on the mathematics of pattern formation (Q5962965): Difference between revisions

As is well known, in the later years of his life, Alan Turing became interested in the mathematics of pattern formation in biological contexts. His only published work in this area, however, was his paper [``The chemical basis of morphogenesis'', Philos. Trans. R. Soc. Lond., Ser. B 237, 37--72 (1952)], which has nevertheless exerted a strong influence on the subsequent development of mathematical biology. Indeed, Turing was one of the first to recognise that the patterns in question could be understood via mathematical models. As one might expect, Turing wrote down more of his ideas in this area than were ever published, and it is the manuscript sources that are filed amongst the Turing papers at King's College, Cambridge, that form the basis for the paper under review. Particular attention is given to the draft notes of a paper entitled `Outline of the development of the daisy', in which Turing proposed model differential equations rather different from those in his published work, and, it is claimed here, anticipated later developments in the mathematics of pattern formation: it appears that Turing was already wrestling with problems that were later picked up by other researchers, and thus might have achieved much more in this area had he lived longer. An edited draft of `Outline of the development of the daisy' is available alongside the paper under review, on the journal's website.