Mathematics underfoot: the formulas that came to Würzburg from New Haven (Q1670969)

The author has cleared up the question on the meaning of two formulas set in the tiled floor in the foyer of the University of Applied Sciences in Wuerzburg. In 1875, in New Haven, Connecticut, Newton and Phillips published a paper on the curves in the Cartesian plane defined by certain transcendental equations. Two patterns shown in this paper were used in 1879 in Wuerzburg to construct the tiled floor in the building where later Roentgen's laboratory was placed.