A university maths tutor has discovered the science behind singledom, finding that our chances of finding the perfect partner are just 1 in 285,000.

Peter Backus, a tutor at the University of Warwick, published his "Why I Don't Have a Girlfriend" thesis after a three-year love drought.

His quirky study uses a famous maths formula called The Drake Equation, which was first used to estimate the existence of extra-terrestrial life.

The results don't look promising¹ for British singles. 30-year-old Mr Backus found that out of the 30 million women in the UK, only 26 would be suitable girlfriends for him.

The mind-numbing equation takes into account the number of women aged 24 to 34, living in his home city of London, and who are single, meaning his chances of meeting his dream woman on a night out are slim.

The economics expert said: "There are 26 women in London with whom I might have a wonderful relationship.

"So, on a given night out in London there is a 0.0000034% chance of meeting one of these special people. That’s a 1 in 285,000 chance, so it's not great.

The baffling Drake equation reads: N = R* x Fp x Ne x Fi x Fc x L, and helped pioneering scientist Professor Drake to predict that there could be 10,000 civilisations in our galaxy².

Mr Backus simply replaced the original equation with his own criteria³ for a dream date, which included the percentage of women likely to find him attractive, and the number of girls aged 24-34 in London.

He said: "The research may sound depressing to people looking for love, but the good news for singles is, it's probably not your fault!"His full thesis is available on the University of Warwick's website日前，英国一名大学数学讲师发现了单身的科学依据，他称人们找到合适伴侣的几率只有1/285000。

英国华威大学的数学讲师皮特?巴克斯在经历了三年的感情空缺后发表了一篇题为《我为什么没有女朋友》的论文。

他在这项奇怪的研究中运用了一个著名的数学公式——“德雷克等式”。这一公式最初被用于估算外星生命存在的几率。

计算结果对于英国的单身人士来说并不乐观。30岁的巴克斯发现，在英国的三千万名女性中，仅有26人适合做他的女朋友。

这一复杂的公式将皮特所居住的伦敦市的年龄在24岁到34岁的单身女性数量纳入计算范围，这意味着他某晚外出邂逅自己梦中情人的几率很低。

这位经济学专家说：“全伦敦只有26名女性可能适合我。

“因此，如果我某天晚上外出，邂逅姻缘的几率为0.0000034%，也就是285000分之一，所以概率很小。

这一令人费解的“德雷克等式”为N = R* x Fp x Ne x Fi x Fc x L，先驱科学家德雷克教授曾利用该公式作出预测：银河系中可能存在1万种文明。

巴克斯只是将自己有关完美情侣的标准代入了等式，其中包括可能觉得他有魅力的女性的比例，以及伦敦年龄在24到34岁的女性数量。

他说：“这一研究可能会让那些正在寻找爱情的人感到沮丧，但对于单身汉来说却是个好消息，那就是单身不一定是你的问题！”

他的全篇论文可登陆华威大学网站查看。