48th Mersenne Prime found

Prime numbers are fascinating. They are akin to atoms in mathematical number structure. Just like atoms are indivisible units of matters so are prime numbers in context of number system. One I first read the news I went straight to GIMPS page as I had a distinct hunch that this must have been discovered by the folks at GIMPS project. Why ? Well the reason are obvious. To verify a prime number of this magnitude one needs computer. It has got over 17 million digits which means if one were to write this number alone with a speed of 1 digit a second it will take over a month to write all the digits ! The number was discovered on 25th of January 2013.