Could Ren\'e Descartes have known this?

Abstract

Below we discuss the partition of the space of real univariate polynomials according to the number of positive and negative roots and signs of the coefficients. We present several series of non-realizable combinations of signs together with the numbers of positive and negative roots. We provide a detailed information about possible non-realizable combinations as above up to degree 8 as well as a general conjecture about such combinations.Comment: 15 pages, no figure