Prime Time

Marin Mersenne, he of the primes

Wow. First, the real ninth planet (we think) and now the largest prime number (so far). This is a time of discoveries. Not that it has any practical value beyond being a good conversation-starter (or -stopper), but this new prime number, which, in addition to being a prime is a Mersenne prime (see how I'm writing as if I had any clue what this all means?), has 22,338,618 digits, so it is referred to by the much less complicated handle M74207281 (really). It was discovered by the very determined Dr. Curtis Cooper of the University of Central Missouri, who also discovered the last largest prime, a couple of years ago (story, video): http://mentalfloss.com/article/74004/largest-prime-number-ever-discovered-has-over-22-million-digits
   This Père (Father) Mersenne (1588-1648), a French mathematician and philosopher, was quite the fascinating individual, as it turns out: http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Biographies/Mersenne.html