The Algebra of Units: From Buckingham's Pi-grec Theorem to Latent-Variable Learning (opens in new tab)

Engineers often measure many quantities-speed, pressure, temperature, length-expressed in different physical units. The Buckingham Pi-grec theorem states that these variables can always be combined into a smaller set of dimensionless numbers whose values fully determine the system's behaviour. Identifying the appropriate dimensionless groups has traditionally required expert knowledge and physical insight. This paper shows that they can instea...