Knots can be named with numbers

Each of these knots is named with two numbers. What are these numbers counting? What changes about the knots as the second number gets bigger?



Here is knot 5-1. How is it like 7-1? How is it different?

There are only 2 knots with 5 crossings. 5-1 is one of them. Can you make the other? Does that seem strange to you that there are only 2, when there are 7 different knots with 7 crossings?



Here is knot 9-1.

Are you starting to see a family resemblance between 5-1, 7-1, and 9-1? There are forty-nine (!) different knots with 9 crossings. How many of them can you make? Begin by following the patterns that you can see in the 7-crossing knots as they change from 7-1, to 7-2, to 7-3, etc.



Here are knots 6-1 and 8-1. The way they are drawn here, they don't look quite the same as 5-1, 7-1, and 9-1? What makes them different?

Can they be twisted around so that they make nice rings the way 5-1, 7-1, and 9-1 do? What kind of a difference do you think that it might make that 5, 7, and 9 are odd numbers and 6 and 8 are even?