Pattern

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A pattern is a form, template, or model (or, more abstractly, a set of rules) which can be used to make or to generate things or parts of a thing, especially if the things that are generated have enough in common for the underlying pattern to be inferred or discerned, in which case the things are said to exhibit the pattern. Pattern matching is the act of checking for the presence of the constituents of a pattern. The detection of underlying patterns is called pattern recognition.

Related Topics:
Form - Template - Model - Rule - Pattern matching - Pattern recognition

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The simplest patterns are based on repetition/periodicity: several copies of a single template are combined without modification. For example, in aviation, a "holding pattern" is a flight path which can be repeated until the aircraft has been granted clearance for landing.

Related Topics:
Repetition - Periodicity

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Pattern recognition is more complex when templates are used to generate variants. For example, in English, sentences often follow the "N-VP" (noun - verb phrase) pattern, but some knowledge of the English language is required to detect the pattern.

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Pattern recognition is studied in many fields, including psychology, ethology, and computer science.

Related Topics:
Psychology - Ethology - Computer science

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Some patterns (for example, many visual patterns) may be directly observable through the senses.

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Some patterns are named. Simple decorative examples are stripes and zigzags. Further examples include the regular tiling of a plane, echoes, and balanced binary branching.

Related Topics:
Stripe - Zigzag - Tiling - Plane - Echoes

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The planets of our solar system are caught in an incredibly ancient pattern by the gravity of the Sun. The planets have been following their (very predictable) elliptical orbits for billions and billions of years. There is certainly a recognizable pattern/cycle there.

Related Topics:
Planets - Solar system - Sun - Elliptical orbits - Pattern - Cycle

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Fractals are mathematical patterns. Naturally occurring patterns obey certain principles also found in fractals, for example self-similarity. Even though self-similarity in nature is only approximate and stochastic, integral measures describing fractal properties can also be applied to natural "fractals" like coastal lines, tree shapes, etc. (see fractal geometry). While the outer appearance of self-similar patterns can be quite complex, the rules needed to describe or produce their formation can be extremely simple (e.g. Lindenmayer systems for the description of tree shapes).

Related Topics:
Fractal - Self-similarity - Coastal lines - Tree shapes - Fractal geometry - Appearance - Rule - Formation - Lindenmayer systems - Description

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Patterns are also common in other areas of mathematics. Recurring decimals will repeat a sequence of digits an infinite number of times. For example, 1 divided by 81 will result in the answer 0.012345679... the numbers 0-9 (except 8) will repeat forever — 1/81 is a recurring decimal.

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In addition to static patterns, there may be patterns of movement such as oscillation.

Related Topics:
Movement - Oscillation

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