Our planet has encountered numerous events of instabilities -  from a rogue wave that rises up from calm waters to an instability inside a gas turbine, to the sudden extinction of a previously hardy wildlife species. Now, scientists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have developed a new algorithm that can predict such extreme events.

The occurrence of extreme events is almost uncertain as it involves a complex and ever-changing mix of players and pieces. The scientists have managed to devise a framework to identify key patterns that appear before an extreme event.

Themistoklis Sapsis, associate professor at MIT said that currently, there is no device to predict the occurrence of extreme events. They made a framework which can be applied to turbulent fluid flows. "They’re encountered in climate dynamics in the form of extreme rainfall, in engineering fluid flows such as stresses around an airfoil, and acoustic instabilities inside gas turbines", said Sapsis.

He stated that the framework can be applied to a wide range of complicated, multidimensional systems to pick out the warning signs that are most likely to occur in the real world.

He added that if such extreme events can be predicted, then strategies can be made to control or avoid them.

The framework involves solving sets of dynamical equations – incredibly complex mathematical formulas that, once solved, can predict the state of a complex system over time.