[Neha]

Nice thread!
Here is the information collected from wikipedia and Google:
MATLAB is a numerical computing environment and programming language. Created by THeMathWorks, MATLAB allows easy matrix manipulation, plotting of interfacesfunctions and data, implementation of algorithms, creation of user, and interfacing with programs in other languages. Although it specializes in numerical computing, an optional toolbox interfaces with the Maple symbolic engine, allowing it to be part of a full computer algebra system.

MATLAB is an interactive system whose basic data element is an array that does not require dimensioning. This allows you to solve many technical computing problems, especially those with matrix and vector formulations, in a fraction of the time it would take to write a program in a scalar noninteractive language such as C or Fortran.

The name MATLAB stands for matrix laboratory. MATLAB was originally written to provide easy access to matrix software developed by the LINPACK and EISPACK projects, which together represent the state-of-the-art in software for matrix computation.