Research Project: Thousands of sunflowers will be planted in honour of the mathematician Alan Turing as part of a new research project led by MOSI (Museum of Science & Industry, Manchester) and Manchester Science Festival, in association with The University of Manchester. A hundred years after Turing was born families, schools, community groups and businesses will be encouraged to plant over 3000 sunflowers to celebrate his work and help solve a mathematical riddle that he worked on before his death in 1954.

Alan Turing is famous for his code-breaking skills which helped to crack the Enigma Code during the Second World War, and as a founder of computer science and artificial intelligence, but later he became fascinated with the mathematical patterns found in stems, leaves and seeds – a study known as phyllotaxis. The spirals on sunflower heads often conform to a Fibonacci number (see notes), and Turing was one…