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AI Solves 300-Year-Old Kissing Number Problem, Surpassing Humans

2/19/2026

Summary

Story summary

PackingStar, the artificial intelligence system, advanced the 300-year-old kissing number problem.
The work surpassed human geometric intuition and standard computing capabilities.
The arXiv preprint was published in November and lists teams from Peking University, Fudan University, and the Shanghai Academy of AI for Science.
Researchers described their collaboration with AI as a romance in science.
The findings have implications for data storage and telecommunications.

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Story summary

PackingStar, the artificial intelligence system, advanced the 300-year-old kissing number problem.
The work surpassed human geometric intuition and standard computing capabilities.
The arXiv preprint was published in November and lists teams from Peking University, Fudan University, and the Shanghai Academy of AI for Science.
Researchers described their collaboration with AI as a romance in science.
The findings have implications for data storage and telecommunications.