The Mind-Boggling Math That (Maybe) Mapped the Brain in 11 Dimensions

Kathryn Hess can't tell the difference between a coffee mug and a bagel. Hess, a researcher at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, is one of the world's leading thinkers in the field of algebraic topology--in super simplified terms, the mathematics of rubbery shapes. It uses algebra to attack the following question: If given two geometric objects, can you deform one to another without making any cuts? The answer, when it comes to bagels and coffee mugs, is yes, yes you can. If that all sounds annoyingly abstract, well, it kind of is.