Overview: What Is Zero?
The number zero has a number of unique properties in mathematics. It is the center of the number line, a placeholder in place value, and the additive identity in algebra. It is neither positive nor negative. Multiplying any number by zero gives the answer zero, but dividing by zero is undefined.
Zero Is Important
The number zero has a special place is science as the absence of a quantity. For example, true or absolute zero is the absence of molecular movement. A neutron has neither a positive or negative electrical charge, but no charge at all.
Zero as a Placeholder
The digit zero is used as a placeholder, so that 101 and 110 do not mean the same as the number 11. A number such as 1,100, 011 is read as “one million, one hundred thousand, and eleven”, and it is vastly different than the number 1, 001, 101 –“one million, one thousand, one hundred, and one”. Before the number zero was used as place value, during the times of ancient Babylonia, mathematicians and accountants had to use context to know which number was which.
Zero as the Center of the Number Line
All numbers to the left of zero on the number line are negative, and all numbers to the right of zero are positive. The X-axis and a Y-axis meet at coordinates (0, 0) on a graph. Zero in set theory means the empty set, and the null value. Zero is not a prime number, because any number multiplied by zero will equal zero.
Zero as the Additive Identity
Any number plus zero will equal that number. In algebra, that is called the identity property of zero. Similarly, any number minus zero will equal that number, and any number minus itself will equal zero. Zero minus any number will give its negative (which has the same absolute value). Multiplying any nonzero number by zero will equal zero. Dividing by zero is undefined because there is no real number that gives a meaningful answer.
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