A forgotten 1953 computer run at Los Alamos launched nonlinear wave science — and Mary Tsingou was written out of its name

creatoroff · x · 2026-10-28

In 1953, Fermi, Pasta, Ulam and programmer Mary Tsingou ran a vibrating-chain simulation on MANIAC at Los Alamos. Left running past its cutoff by accident, the energy flowed back almost entirely into the original wave — as if the chain remembered its start. That surprise helped launch modern nonlinear wave science; Tsingou, who wrote the code, was left out of the problem's name for decades.

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A forgotten 1953 computer run at Los Alamos launched nonlinear wave science — and Mary Tsingou was written out of its name

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