A cubic surface is one defined by a polynomial equation of degree 3. Cayley’s nodal cubic surface, drawn above by Abdelaziz Nait Merzouk, is the cubic surface with the largest possible number of ordinary double points and no other singularities: that is, points where it looks like the origin of the cone in 3-dimensional space defined by \(x^2 + y^2 = z^2\). It has 4 ordinary double points, shown here at the vertices of a regular tetrahedron.

An octic surface is one defined by a polynomial equation of degree 8. The Endrass octic, drawn above by Abdelaziz Nait Merzouk, is currently the octic surface with the largest known number of ordinary double points: that is, points where it looks like the origin of the cone in 3-dimensional space defined by \(x^2 + y^2 = z^2\). It has 168 ordinary double points, while the best known upper bound for a octic surface that’s smooth except for such singularities is 174.