Former NVIDIA employee discovers largest prime number with 41M digits
In a major breakthrough in the world of mathematics, a former NVIDIA employee and independent researcher Luke Durant has discovered the largest known prime number yet. Using a free software program known as the Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search (GIMPS), he has found a prime number that is a whopping 41 million digits long and is now the 52nd known Mersenne prime. The largest known prime number is now 2^136,279,841 - 1, with a massive 41,024,320 decimal digits.
Innovative approach to prime number discovery
Durant's groundbreaking technique used thousands of GPUs across 24 data centers in 17 countries. This was a major departure from the conventional method of using personal computers for such discoveries. The GIMPS statement noted this change, adding that Durant's technique "ends the 28-year reign of ordinary personal computers finding these huge prime numbers."
The significance and potential applications of Mersenne primes
The GIMPS team has also noted that as of now, there are few practical applications of large Mersenne primes. This has led some to question the value of searching for them. However, it's important to remember that similar doubts were raised decades ago before crucial cryptography algorithms were developed based on prime numbers.
Durant's journey and the verification of his discovery
Durant started contributing to GIMPS in October 2023, realizing the possibilities of quickly growing GPU availability in the cloud. After almost a year of testing, he made his landmark discovery on October 11 when an NVIDIA A100 GPU in Dublin, Ireland reported that M136279841 is probably prime. The next day, an NVIDIA H100 in San Antonio, Texas confirmed its primality with a Lucas-Lehmer test.
GIMPS: A long-standing project for prime number discovery
GIMPS is one of the longest-running distributed projects in the world, originally designed only for Intel PCs. However, over the years, it has evolved to support a wide range of processors and GPUs. Today, GIMPS offers a comprehensive suite of programs for various CPUs and GPUs, marking a significant progress in the field of prime number discovery.
