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 promising 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 galaxy.

Mr Backus simply replaced the original equation with his own criteria 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.

(Read by Lee Hannon. Lee Hannon is a multimedia journalist at the China Daily Web site.)

(Agencies)