If your name gets picked for jury duty, it’s because a computer used a random number generator to select it. The same goes for tax audits or when you opt for a quick pick lottery ticket. But how can ...

Katie has a PhD in maths, specializing in the intersection of dynamical systems and number theory. She reports on topics from maths and history to society and animals. Katie has a PhD in maths, ...

Using a single, chip-scale laser, scientists have managed to generate streams of completely random numbers at about 100 times the speed of the fastest random-numbers generator systems that are ...

Whether it’s a game of D&D or encrypting top-secret information, a wide array of methods are available for generating the needed random numbers with high enough entropy for their use case. For a ...

To simulate chance occurrences, a computer can’t literally toss a coin or roll a die. Instead, it relies on special numerical recipes for generating strings of shuffled digits that pass for random ...

Generating random lists of numbers in Excel is handy for randomizing lists, statistical sampling, and many other uses. However, Excel's random number functions are volatile, meaning they change ...

The static from a old radio is a form of random interference caused by electromagnetic activity in the atmosphere (Credit: Getty Images) Our world runs on randomly generated numbers and without them a ...