Braniacs and mathematicians alike will be enjoying todays Google Doodle, which celebrates the birthday of numerical genius Pierre de Fermat and his famous 'Fermat's last theorem'. 

The mathematical impossibility has reached almost legendary levels of fame amongst those on the scientific cutting edge, due simply to how difficult it is to prove. 

Us Pocket-linters aren't exactly Oxbridge educated mathematicians, but we will have our best go at explaining it. Essentially if you take a2+ b2 = c2, a common mathematical certainty and swap the 2 for an n, can you prove the n mathematically. 

Fermat said he had way back in 1637, scrawling "I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of this, which this margin is too narrow to contain." in the book Arithmetica. 

It wasn't until 1993 that anyone even came close to putting forward proof of the theory. The man responsible was Andrew Wiles, an Oxford mathematics professor. His idea was however shown to be incomplete, it wasn't until 1995 that he successfully prove things, when he found a2+ b2 = c2 was only true when n=2 (don't ask us). The paper itself which proved it was more than 100 pages long.

Horizon made a brilliant documentary about Andrew Wiles's discovery which helps clarify the whole thing. It is famous for this unique moment where Wiles realises what he has achieved with his life.  

Google never ceases to outdo itself with its doodles, still nothing for us will better the playable guitar to celebrate Les Paul's 96th birthday.