Timeline

A brief overview of the major milestones in science and engineering.

30000BC Palaeolithic peoples in central Europe and France record numbers on bones.
25000BC Early geometric designs used.
9000BC Sheep are domesticated in the Middle East.
7400BC Corn is domesticated in the Oaxaca Valley.
7000BC Wheat is domesticated in Mesopotamia.
6500BC Cattle are domesticated in Mesopotamia.
6000BC Copper artifacts are common in the Middle East.
5000BC Barley is domesticated in Egypt.
4400BC Potatoes are domesticated in Peru and Bolivia.
4000BC Light wooden plows are used in Mesopotamia.
3500BC Kiln-fired bricks and pots are made in Mesopotamia.

Irrigation is developed in Mesopotamia.
3400BC The first symbols for numbers, simple straight lines, are used in Egypt.
3200BC Wheeled vehicles are used in Uruk.
3000BC Square-sailed ships used in Egypt.

Draft oxen are used in Mesopotamia.

Potter's wheel used in Mesopotamia.

Evidence of soldering being used in Iraq.
2800BC Pyramids are built in Egypt.
2600BC Egyptians invent use of glassware.
2500BC Bronze is developed in Mesopotamia.
2296BC A comet is observed for the first time.
2136BC Solar eclipse recorded by Chinese.
2000BC Horse drawn vehicles are used in Egypt.
1750BC Tin is discovered.
1700BC Horse riding is developed on the Eurasia steppes.
1600BC Zodiac established by Chaldean astronomers.
1500BC Copper is smelted in China. Rice paddies are developed in China.
1400BC Iron working is developed in the Middle East.
1360BC A decimal number system with no zero starts to be used in China.
1300BC Horse drawn vehicles are developed in China.

Fine wire made by the Egyptians by beating gold sheet and cutting it into strips.
1000BC Chinese use counting boards for calculation.
900BC Chinese use natural gas from wells.
800BC Mounted archers are developed on the Eurasian steppes.

Sunspot recorded for the first time by Chinese.

Greek texts mention the Magnetic properties of the naturally occurring lodestone were first time.
635BC Chinese note that the tails of comets point away from the Sun.
600BC Archimedean screw used for irrigation in Egypt.

Thales asserted that matter exists in three forms namely mist, water and earth.

Thales noted that iron was attracted to lodestone.
585BC Thales correctly predicted solar eclipse.
550BC Pythagoras' theorem proposed by Pythagoras.
530BC Anaximenes suggested that air is the primary substance.
512BC Chinese make cast iron using blast furnaces.
500BC Anaximenes introduced the ideas of condensation and rarefaction.
480BC Angle of Earth's tilt to ecliptic is calculated by Oenopides.
470BC Anaxagoras suggests that the Sun, Moon and stars are composed from the same matter as Earth
450BC Anaxagoras proposes that the Moon shines with the light of the Sun and from this was able to explain the eclipses.

Archytas of Tarentum invents the screw.
440BC The concept of the atom as an indivisible unit of matter is introduced by Leucippus of Miletus.
400BC Cross bow is developed in China.
387BC Plato founds his Academy in Athens.
370BC Leucippus and Democritus proposed that matter is made of small, indestructible particles.
330BC Pytheas proposed that tides are caused by the Moon.
300BC Euclidean geometry proposed by Euclid.

Aristarchus proposed that the earth revolves around the sun; calculated diameter of the earth.

The number of volumes in the Library of Alexandria reached 500,000.

Stirrups are used in China.
270BC Chinese describe the five elements as water, metal, wood, fire and earth.

Water clock built by Ctesibius.
250BC Principle of buoyancy and levers developed by Archimedes.
240BC Hydrostatics formulated by Archimedes.
230BC Eratosthenes of Cyrene develops his sieve method for finding all prime numbers.

Nicomedes writes his treatise On conchoid lines which contain his discovery of the curve known as the "Conchoid of Nicomedes".
225BC Apollonius of Perga writes Conics in which he introduces the terms "parabola", "ellipse" and "hyperbola".
220BC Archimedes made discoveries in mathematics and mechanics.

An accurate measurement of the circumference of the Earth is made by Eratosthenes.
200BC Romans first use concrete.
196BC Rosetta stone was created.
190BC Chinese mathematicians use powers of 10 to express magnitudes.
150BC Hypsicles writes On the Ascension of Stars. In this work he is the first to divide the Zodiac into 360 degrees. Iron moldboard plows in use in China.
127BC Hipparchus discovers the precession of the equinoxes and calculates the length of the year to within 6.5 minutes of the correct value. His astronomical work uses an early form of trigonometry.
100BC Chinese mathematicians are the first to introduce negative numbers. Waterwheels used in Greece and Rome. Beginnings of collar harness in China.
50BC Steam engine invented by Heron of Alexandria.
1 Chinese mathematician Liu Hsin uses decimal fractions.
20 Geminus writes a number of astronomy texts and The Theory of Mathematics. He tries to prove the parallel postulate.
50 Chinese mathematician Sun-tzi presents the first known example of an indeterminate equation.
60 Heron of Alexandria writes Metrica (Measurements). It contains formulas for calculating areas and volumes.
90 The Chinese invent magic squares. Nicomachus of Gerasa writes Arithmetike eisagoge (Introduction to Arithmetic) which is the first work to treat arithmetic as a separate topic from geometry.
100 The classical Chinese mathematics text Jiuzhang Suanshu (Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art) begins to be assembled.
105 First paper made by Ts'ai Lun.
110 Menelaus of Alexandria writes Sphaerica which deals with spherical triangles and their application to astronomy.
122 Construction of Hadrian′s Wall begins.
132 First seismograph invented by Zhang Heng.
150 Ptolemy produces many important geometrical results with applications in astronomy. His version of astronomy will be the accepted one for well over one thousand years.
180 First alchemy writings appeared in Egypt.
190 Chinese mathematicians calculated pi to five decimal places.
250 The Maya civilization of Central America uses an almost place-value number system to base 20. Diophantus of Alexandria writes Arithmetica, a study of number theory problems in which only rational numbers are allowed as solutions.
263 By using a regular polygon with 192 sides Liu Hui calculates the value of pi as 3.14159 which is correct to five decimal places.
271 Chinese mathematicians invented the magnetic compass.
340 Pappus of Alexandria writes Synagoge (Collections) which is a guide to Greek geometry.
390 Theon of Alexandria produces a version of Euclid's Elements (with textual changes and some additions) on which almost all subsequent editions are based.
400 Hypatia writes commentaries on Diophantus and Apollonius. She is the first recorded female mathematician and she distinguishes herself with remarkable scholarship. She becomes head of the Neo-Platonist school at Alexandria.

Term Chemistry used by scholars of Alexandria to describe changing matter.
415 A mob of rioters burned down the Library of Alexandria, and much of the recorded knowledge of the western world was lost.
594 Decimal notation is used for numbers in India. This is the system on which our current notation is based
600 Windmills used in Iran.
628 Brahmagupta writes Brahmasphutasiddanta (The Opening of the Universe), a work on astronomy; on mathematics. He uses zero and negative numbers, gives methods to solve quadratic equations, sum series, and compute square roots.
790 Chinese begin to use finite difference methods.
810 Al-Khwarizmi writes important works on arithmetic, algebra, geography, and astronomy. In particular Hisab al-jabr w'al-muqabala (Calculation by Completion and Balancing), gives us the word "algebra", from "al-jabr". From al-Khwarizmi's name, as a consequence of his arithmetic book, comes the word "algorithm".
834 The rotary grindstone is described for the first time.
850 Triangular sails used in the Mediterranean.
880 Arabian chemists make alcohol by distilling wine.
1040 Gunpowder in China.
1066 A large comet is sighted. In Britain it is thought to be connected to the invasion of William the Conqueror from France. It will revisit Earth in 1985/6 - we know it today as Halley's comet.
1086 The domesday Book was written. Shen Kua, a Chinese scientist, writes his Dream Pool Essays, in these he outlines the principles of erosion, sedimentation and uplift which are still used in earth science today. He also makes the first known reference to the use of a magnetic compass for navigation.
1126 First artesian well dug in Artois.
1180 Use of a glass mirror is recorded.
1199 Alexander Neckam from St Albans writes De naturis rerum ("On natural things") and makes the first known Western reference to the magnetic compass.
1232 Rockets invented in China to defend city of Kaifeng against Mongol invaders.
1250 The magnifying glass was invented by Roger Bacon
1269 Maricourt used compass to discover that a magnet is encircled by lines which terminate on two poles.
1270 In 1270 Witelo publishes his Perspectiva, a book on optics which deals with refraction, reflection and geometrical optics. Perhaps most importantly, Witelo rejects the current idea that rays of light are emitted from the eye.
1284 Al-Quarashi (also known as Ibn al-Nafis) works out the correct anatomy of the heart and the way in which the blood flows through it.
1285 Spectacles are invented in Italy.
1348 The plague appeared in Europe.
1390 The first paper mill began operating in Germany.
1414 Influenza ('flu) is recorded as a disease for the first time in Paris.
1455 The Gutenberg Bible became the first book printed with movable metal type.
1500 Chinese scientist Wan Hu ties 47 gunpowder Rockets to a chair in an effort to make a flying machine, but it explodes and kills him!
1504 Christopher Columbus correctly predicts the total eclipse of the moon.
1508 Leonardo da Vinci started to compile notebooks on mechanics, astronomy, anatomy, and his inventions.
1515 Leonardo da Vinci described the camera obscura.
1517 Girolamo Francastoro explains fossils as the remains of actual organisms - he decides that there are too many to be simply the result of Noah's flood.
1520 The Swiss doctor and alchemist Philippus Aureolus Paracheus introduces laudanum (made from opium) as a pain killer.
1540 The book Astronomicon Caesareum by Peter Apian notes that the tails of comets point away from the Sun, a fact known by the Chinese since 635 AD.
1543 Heliocentric universe restated by Nicolaus Copernicus.

Vasalius published treatise on human anatomy
1545 A book on surgery by the French author Ambroise Paré suggests treating wounds with soothing ointments instead of boiling oil.
1546 Girolamo Fracastoro puts forward the idea that diseases are like seeds that can be transferred from one person to another.
1552 The Italian anatomist Bartolemeo Eustachio discovers the adrenal glands, the detailed structure of the teeth and the Eustachian tubes which were named after him, although his work is not published until 1711.
1557 = sign used by Robert Record.

The first mention of the metal platinum in any written text.
1560 An Italian physicist forms the first scientific society. This is suppressed by the Inquisition.
1565 The first known drawings of fossils are published. Konrad von Gesner, the artist who did them, thinks they are tools that look like bones or shells.
1570 Brahe discovered supernova in constellation Cassiopeia.

The pinhole camera is invented around this time.
1579 The first glass eyes are made.
1581 Galileo uses his pulse to time the swinging of the lamps in the cathedral at Pisa. He concludes that the time for a lamp to swing does not depend on the angle through which it swings. This observation eventually leads to the development of pendulum clocks.
1585 Decimal fraction/point introduced by Simon Stevin.
1591 Thomas Harriot, an English mathematician, first notes snowflakes are six pointed or six sided although he does not publish this observation. The hexagonal character of snowflakes has been known in China from at least the 2nd century BC.
1592 Galileo develops a type of thermometer based on air.
1597 Andreas Libavius publishes Alchemia. This chemistry textbook describes how to make hydrochloric acid and ammonium sulphate and other chemicals.
1599 The first serious textbook of zoology is published by Ulisse Aldrovandi.
1600 William Gilbert discovered that electricity occurs in things other than amber; wrote a book on magnetism. Gilbert also discovered that the earth is one giant magnet.
1602 Vincenzio Casarido discovers barium sulphide.
1604 Johannes Kepler describes how the eye focuses light and also shows that the brightness (intensity) of light decreases as distance squared from its source.
1607 Thermometer invented by Galileo.
1608 Refracting telescope invented by Hans Lippershey.
1609 Kepler announced his 1st and 2nd laws.

Galileo hears of Lippershey's telescope and builds his own version. He eventually achieves a magnification of about 30x.
1610 Jupiter's satellites discovered by Galileo.
1611 Galileo, Thomas Harriot, Johannes Fabricius and Christoph Scheiner all claim to have seen sunspots on the surface of the Sun. Galileo says he first saw them three years earlier but did not publish anything, thinking that they were the planet Mercury passing in front of the Sun.
1614 Logarithms proposed by John Napier.

The first recorded measurements of changes in weight, pulse and temperature are made by Sanctorius Sanctorius, taken from his own body using a very primitive thermometer.
1616 Galileo called to Rome and ordered to stop supporting the Copernican theory.
1619 Kepler announced his 3rd law.
1620 Submarine invented by Cornelius Drebbel.

Bacon published "Novum Organum" (scientific method and inductive reasoning).
1621 Snell discovered the law of refraction.
1622 William Oughtred invents the slide rule.
1623 William Schickardt builds the first calculating machine from wood.
1628 Harvey published a book describing blood circulation.
1633 The Inquisition denounced Galileo
1637 Cartesian coordinates introduced by Rene Descartes. Descartes Published "Geometry". René Descartes describes his theory of the refraction of light, and also publishes an explanation for rainbows and cloud formation.
1638 Galileo published "Discourses Concerning Two New Sciences", summarizing the principles of mechanics in which he discusses the laws of motion and friction, updating and correcting the ideas of Aristotle. Although Aristotle's ideas date from the 4th century BC, they had survived unchallenged until this time.
1641 Galileo's son designs a pendulum clock using his father's ideas.
1642 Principles of hydraulics proposed by Blaise Pascal. Pascal invented the mechanical adding machine.
1643 Torricelli makes the first barometer using mercury in a sealed glass column - he also creates the first vacuum known to science when he inverts the tube of mercury over a dish of mercury and the level drops.
1650 Archbishop Usher estimated by reading the Bible that the earth was created on October 23, 4004 BC at 9:00am.
1651 The life of plants - their anatomy, their reproduction and their classification - becomes much more clearly understood through the work of John Ray and others.
1652 Pascal discovered laws of fluid pressure.
1654 Guericke invented the vacuum pump.
1656 Edmund Halley discovers the periodicity of the comets and the motion of the stars, whilst Giovanni Domenico Cassini studies the solar system ands discovers a great deal about planets and their moons.

Pendulum clock invented by Christiaan Huygens.

The Dutch scientist Christiaan Huygens discovers the rings of Saturn.
1660 Redi disproved theory of spontaneous generation with experiment on flies.
1666 Newton invented the calculus. Newton discovered glass prism separates white light into spectrum.
1667 Hennig Brand accidentally discovers the element phosphorus during an experiment with urine, but he keeps it secret and Robert Boyle later discovers and describes the element.
1668 Reflecting telescope invented by Isaac Newton
1675 Leibniz independently invented the calculus.
1678 Polarization of light discovered by Christiaan Huygens.
1687 Laws of gravity proposed by Isaac Newton. Newton published "Principia", describing the laws of motion.
1690 Locke published "Essay Concerning Human Understanding" (empiricism, tabula rasa).
1691 John Ray suggests that fossils are the remains of animals from the distant past.
1693 John Ray publishes the first important classification of animals and correctly puts whales in with the other mammals.
1694 The German scientist Rudolph Camerarius shows the difference between the male and the female reproductive organs in plants.
1697 Anton van Leeuwenhoek explains his discovery of what he calls "animalculae" using his microscope.
1701 Giacomo Pylanni inoculates three children with smallpox in Constantinople in the hope of preventing more serious smallpox when they are older, thus becoming the first immunologist.

Seed drill invented by Jethro Tull.
1704 Newton published "Opticks".
1705 Edmund Halley predicts the return in 1758 of a comet which had last appeared in 1682. The comet becomes known as Halley's Comet.

Thomas Newcomen invents a steam engine which uses both atmospheric pressure and low-pressure steam to pump water out of mines.
1709 Gabriel David Fahrenheit constructs an alcohol thermometer.

Abraham Darby introduces the use of coke for iron smelting at Coalbrookdale, England.
1712 Thomas Newcomen patents his atmospheric engine.
1714 Fahrenheit builds a mercury thermometer, using a scale which is later named after him.

The British Parliament offers a prize of £2000 for a solution to the problem of calculating longitude. The French government will offer a similar prize in 1716.

The first patent for a typewriter was filed by Henry Milne.
1715 Taylor power series published by Brook Taylor.
1726 John Harrison constructs a gridiron compensating pendulum clock.
1728 Euler's number e = 2.17828 introduced by Leonhard Euler.

A debate about the nature of combustion rages among scientists. Many scientists believe that substances that burn contain "phlogiston", a substance that is released during burning. It is later shown that metals gain weight when they burn in air, which seems to suggest that the phlogiston theory is untrue. Supporters of the theory get around this by putting forward the idea that phlogiston has negative weight - so when a substances gives off phlogiston it gains weight!
1730 Sextent invented. n solutions to nth root given by Abraham de Moivre
1733 Charles François de Cisternay Du Fay discovers 2 types of static electricity, and that like charges repel each other whilst unlike charges attract. Force law of equal and opposite electric charges found by Dufay.
1734 f(x) function symbol introduced by Leonhard Euler
1735 Cobalt discovered by G. Brandt in Stockholm, Sweden.
1736 The first distinction is made between sodium and potassium salts.
1737 John Harrison produces a naval chronometer, allowing determination of exact longitudes at sea.
1738 Daniel Bernoulli produces a theory explaining the relationship between the pressure of a fluid and its velocity.
1741 An animal called Steller's sea cow is discovered living off the coast of Soviet Union. Only 27 years later it has been hunted to extinction.
1742 Anders Celcius invents the Celcius temperature scale. In its original form the scale has 0 degrees for the boiling point of water and 100 degrees for its freezing point.
1743 The Celcius scale is changed by Jean Pierre Christin so that 0 degrees is the freezing point of water and 100 degrees is its boiling point.
1744 Mikhail Vasilievich Lomonosor publishes a paper which contains the first description of heat as a form of motion.
1746 Theory of complex numbers discovered by Jean d'Alembert.
1747 The American scientist Benjamin Franklin carries out much work on electricity, although he will not carry out his famous kite experiment for another five years.

The French writer Voltaire is influential in spreading Newton's ideas about gravitation and the movement of celestial bodies. In continental Europe at this time most people still accept the ideas put forward by Descartes. Voltaire lived with Madame du Chatelet who begins translating Newton's Principia during this year, until she dies in childbirth.
1748 Transformation from Cartesian to polar coordinates given by Euler.
1749 The Chinese method of refrigeration is explained by Jean-Jacques d' Ortous de Mairan, who realises that it is based on the cooling effect of evaporation - the principle of the modern refrigerator.

Comte de Buffon produces a definition of a species - "a group of organisms capable of breeding and producing fertile offspring". This definition will remain the accepted definition in the 21st century.
1751 Nickel discovered by A.F. Cronstedt in Stockholm, Sweden.
1755 Magnesium recognised by Joseph Black in Edinburgh, Scotland.
1756 Joseph Black's experiments on magnesia, quicklime and other alkaline substances is the first quantitative chemical research.
1758 Linnaeus developed taxonomy of species, proposed binomial nomenclature.

Halley's comet appears on 25th December, exactly in accordance with predictions.
1759 Kaspar Wolff describes how different tissues develop in an embryo, challenging the idea that sperm contain a complete miniature creature which simply grows in the mother.

John Harrison completes "No. 4", the marine chronometer that will eventually win the longitude prize.
1761 Joseph Black discovers latent heat by finding that when ice melts it absorbs energy but does not change temperature.
1764 Hargreaves invented the spinning jenny.
1766 Hydrogen discovered by Henry Cavendish.
1767 John Michell suggests the existence of physical binary stars.
1768 Leonhard Euler suggests that the wavelength of light determines its colour
1769 Watt invented the modern steam engine.

Cugnot's carriage is the first large steam tractor. It was slow, clumsy and difficult to control.
1770 Development of hyperbolic trigonometry.
1771 Charles Messier publishes a list of nebulae.
1772 The French scientists Antoine Lavoisier begins his experiments on combustion, burning diamond and showing that when sulphur or phosphorus burn the gain in weight is due to combination with atmospheric air.

English scientist Joseph Priestley shows that growing plants can restore air that has been made 'lifeless' by animals breathing it or fire burning in it.

Nitrogen discovered by Daniel Rutherford.
1773 Captain Cook's ship Resolution crosses the Antarctic circle.
1774 Priestley publishes his work on oxygen.

Sir Percival Potts links soot with the scrotal and nasal cancers which chimney sweeps get - the first link between environment and cancer.

James Watt moves to Birmingham and enters a partnership with Matthew Boulton, designing and manufacturing steam engines for customers.

Manganese discovered by J.G. Grahn in Stockholm, Sweden.
1775 Priestley discovered hydrochloric and sulphuric acid.
1776 Lavoisier invented oxygen cutting of metals.
1777 Imaginary number i introduced by Leonhard Euler.

Lavoisier proposed idea of chemical compounds made of elements.

In Germany Carl Wenzel works on reaction rates and shows that the rate at which a metal dissolves in an acid is proportional to the concentration of the acid.
1778 Lavoisier proposed that air is made of two different gases.

Alessandro Volta discovered methane gas in marshes.
1779 The World's first iron bridge is constructed across the River Severn at Ironbridge, England.

Lazzaro Spallanzani describes the role of semen in fertilisation, and shows that sperm have to make physical contact with the egg for fertilisation to take place.

Lavoisier shows that combustion and respiration involve combination with part of the atmosphere. At first he calls this part of the atmosphere "eminently respirable air". On Spetember 5 he proposes the name "oxigène" (from the Greek meaning "acid forming") based on his belief that all acids contain this gas.
1780 Chromium is discovered by N.L. Vanquelin in Paris, France.
1781 Uranus discovered by William Herschel.
1782 Potential introduced by Pierre Simon Laplace.

The 17 year-old English astronomer John Goodricke suggests that the star Algol has an invisible companion star which causes the variation in its brightness.
1783 Michel and Montgolfier invented the hot air balloon; de Rozier becomes the first person to fly, altitude 1800m.

First parachute used by Sebastien Lenormand when he jumped from the tower of Montpelier Observatory in France.

Tellurium discovered by Baron Franz Josef Mu¨ller von Reichenstein in Sibiu, Roumania.
Tungsten isolated by J.J. and F. Elhuyar in Vergara, Spain.
1784 Theory on the Structure of the Crystals published by Rene-Just Hauy.
1785 Coulomb confirmed the inverse square law for electric force.

Hutton proposed the idea of uniformitatianism in the geological history of the earth.

Cartwright invented the power loom for producing cloth.

James Watt's steam engine first used to power a cotton mill.
1786 Caroline Herschel discovers a comet.
1787 Berthollet proposed system of chemical nomenclature.
1788 Variational mechanics given by Joseph Louis LaGrange.
1789 Uranium and Zirconium discovered by M.H. Klaproth in Berlin, Germany.
1790 Semaphore invented by Claude Chappe.
1791 Titanium discovered by Rev. William Gregor in Cornwall, England.

Jeremias Richter noted that acids and bases neutralise in equal proportions.
1792 Rousseau wrote "Social Contract".
1793 Whitney invented the cotton gin.
1794 First liquid battery built by Alessandro Volta.

Antoine Lavoisier is executed in Paris on May 8. The judge presiding at his trial is reputed to have said "The Republic has no need of scientists."

Yttrium discovered by J. Gadolin in Abo, Finland.
1795 Sailors in the British navy are given lime juice to prevent scurvy.
1796 Jenner discovered smallpox vaccination.
1797 Vauquelin discovers chromium.
1798 Pierre-Simon Laplace predicts the existence of black holes.
1799 Fundamental theorem of algebra proven by Karl Friedrich Gauss. Discovery of the Rosetta Stone.
1800 Ampere discovered properties of magnetic field produced by electric current.

William Cruikshank was the first to use chlorine to purify water.
1801 John Dalton publishes his law of partial pressures for gases.

Infrared solar rays discovered by William Herschel.

Niobium discovered by C. Hatchett in London, England.

Vanadium discovered by A.M. del Rio, Mexico City.
1802 Tantalum discovered by A.G. Ekeberg in Uppsala, Sweden.
1803 Atomic theory proposed by John Dalton. Dalton composed the law of definite proportions in chemistry.

Richard Trevithick constructs the first steam locomotive.

Osmium and Iridium discovered by Smithson Tennant in London, England.

Rhodium and Palladium discovered by W.H. Woollaston in London, England.
1804 Nicholas de Saussure shows that plants need carbon dioxide from the air and nitrogen from the soil. Up until now it has been assumed that they get carbon from the soil.

The first canning factory is opened following the invention of the process by Nicholas Appert, a French sweet maker.

Rockets developed by the British Army Corp reached height of 1830m.

Bessel publishes a paper on the orbit of Halley's comet using data from Harriot's observations 200 years earlier.
1805 Praseodymium discovered by Baron Auer von Welsbach in Vienna, Austria.
1806 Sodium discovered by Humphry Davy.

The first amino acid - asparagine - is discovered.

Legendre develops the method of least squares to find best approximations to a set of observed data.
1807 Chemicals are classified as either ORGANIC OR INORGANIC by the Swedish chemist Jöns Jakob Berzelius.

The Danish physicist and chemist Hans Christian Oersted starts looking for a connection between electricity and magnesium.

Fulton invented the steamboat.

Potassium discovered by Sir Humphrey Davy in London.
1808 Dalton published a periodic table based on atomic weights.

The English chemist Humphry Davy discovers barium, strontium, calcium and isolates magnesium. He also discovers boron at the same time as the French chemists Joseph-Louis Gay-Lussac and Louis-Jacques Thénard.

Etienne-Louis Malus discovers polarised light.

Ruthenium discovered by J.A. Sniadecki at the University of Vilno, Poland.
1809 The French botanist and zoologist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck states that animals evolved from simple worms. He suggests that evolution comes about as organisms acquire characteristics during their lifetime. These are then passed on to their offspring.
1810 The German doctor Samuel Hahnemann publishes his book Organon of Rational Healing, in which he explains the ideas behind a method of healing which he calls "homeopathy".
1811 Avogadro introduced the concept of the mole.
1812 Laplace publishes the two volumes of Théorie Analytique des probabilités (Analytical Theory of Probabilities). The first book studies generating functions and also approximations to various expressions occurring in probability theory. The second book contains Laplace's definition of probability, Bayes's rule, and mathematical expectation.
1813 Swiss-French botanist Augustin de Candolle introduces the word taxonomy.
1814 Stephenson invented the locomotive engine.

The Times of London introduced the first steam-press.
1815 Sir Humphry Davy invented the safety lamp.

Peter Roget (the author of Roget's Thesaurus) invents the "log-log" slide rule.
1816 Speed of sound in gases interpreted as adiabatic compression by Laplace.

Humphry Davy discovers that platinum can act as a catalyst in certain types of chemical reaction.
1817 Cadmium discovered by Friederich Strohmeyer.

A pandemic of cholera begins in India and spreads to East Africa and most of Asia, including Japan and the Philippines.

Bessel discovers a class of integral functions, now called "Bessel functions", in his study of a problem of Kepler to determine the motion of three bodies moving under mutual gravitation.

Lithium discovered by J.A. Arfvedson in Stockholm, Sweden.

Selenium discovered by J.J. Berzelius in Stockholm, Sweden.
1818 Louis-Jacques Thénard discovers hydrogen peroxide by accident.
1819 The English chemist John Kidd extracts naphthalene from coal tar. This is the first of many useful substances to be discovered in coal tar, a thick black liquid made when coal is heated to make coke and gas.
1820 Hans Oersted discovered that an electric current causes the deflection of compass needle.
1821 Electric motor invented by Michael Faraday.

Thermoelectricity discovered by Thomas Seebeck.

Navier gives the well known "Navier-Stokes equations" for an incompressible fluid.

Lithium isolated by W.T. Brande.
1822 Fourier series used to represent functions by Jean Baptiste Fourier.

Dinosaur fossil first recognised by Mary Ann Mantell.

Champollion translated the Rosetta Stone.
1823 Integral law between magnetic field and electric current published by Andre Marie Ampere.

Limit concept introduced into calculus by A.L.Cauchy.
1824 Fourier series used for general solution of heat conduction equation by Jean Baptiste Joseph Fourier.

Electromagnet invented by William Sturgeon.

The French physicist Nicholas Léonard Sadi Carnot publishes his book Réflexions sur la Puissance Motrice du Feu. This links work and heat, defines work and gets close to the second law of thermodynamics. It also proposes the idea of the internal combustion engine.

Silicon discovered by J.J. Berzelius in Stockholm, Sweden.
1825 Discovery of Ampere's Force Law.

Stockton and Darlington Railway is the World's first public transport system.

Michael Faraday isolates benzene by the fractional distillation of whale oil.

The German chemist Richard Erlenmeyer synthesises lots of organic compounds and also invents a way of representing single, double and triple bonds between atoms.
1826 The German anatomist Karl Gegenbaur shows that all vertebrate cells arise from divisions of the egg and sperm.
1827 Ohm's law proposed by Georg Ohm.

Phosphorus matches invented by John Walker. Brown discovered Brownian motion.

The German chemist Friedrich Wöhler develops a new method to prepare aluminium in pure form. Aluminium remains the most expensive metal on Earth. During the 19th century some aluminium jewellery is made.
1828 Urea synthesised by Friedrich Wohler, the first organic compound to have been made in a laboratory and disproved the idea that organic compounds could only be made by living organisms under the influence of a "vital force".
1829 The term 'kinetic energy' is used for the first time.

Johann Schönlein describes the genetic blood disease haemophilia.

Thorium discovered by J.J. Berzelius in Stockholm.
1830 The first railroad, between Liverpool and Manchester, England.

Poisson introduces "Poisson's ratio" in elasticity which involves stresses and strains on materials.

The first color sound cartoon, called Fiddlesticks, is made by Ub Iwerks.
1831 Faraday (England) and Henry (U.S.) independently discovered that a current is produced in a wire when it is moved near a magnet.
1832 Group theory discovered by Evarista Galois.
1833 John Lane develops the steel plough.

At a meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, William Whewell uses the term 'scientist' for the first time.
1834 Charles Babbage draws up the first plans for a digital computer.

Second law of thermodynamics proposed by Benoit-Pierre Clapeyron.
1835 Charles Darwin visits the Galapagos Islands.
1836 The German anatomist Heinrich Wilhelm Gottfried von Waldeyer-Hartz discovers that the nervous system is not a continuous system but that it is build up from separate cells that do not actually touch each other.

The combine harvester is used for the first time in the USA

In Germany Theodor Schwann discovers the first known animal pepsin which acts on proteins in the stomach.
1837 Braile invented by Louis Braille.
1838 John Ericsson develops the screw propeller.
1839 Integral law of electrostatics and magnetostatics given by Karl Friedrich Gauss.

Fuel Cell invented by William Grove. Goodyear invented vulcanized rubber.

Lamé proves Fermat's Last Theorem for n = 7.

Lanthanum discovered by C.G. Mosander in Stockholm, Sweden.
1840 The Italian physicist Giovanni Battista Amici invents the oil immersion microscope. He introduces a number of innovations which lead to microscopes which can enlarge up to 6,000 times. This makes the understanding of cells much easier.
1841 Heat effect of electric current found by James Prescott Joule.

Carbon-zinc battery invented by Robert Bunsen.

Gauss publishes a treatise on optics in which he gives a formulae for calculating the position and size of the image formed by a lens with a given focal length.
1842 The American surgeon Crawford Williamson Long claims to have performed the first operation using ether as an anaesthetic, while cutting out a tumour from a patient's neck. However, he does not announce his results until 1849.

Erbium discovered by C.G. Mosander in Stockholm, Sweden.
1843 The English astronomer John Couch Adams calculates the position of Neptune without ever seeing it. He does this using the irregularities in the orbit of Uranus, but remains uncertain about his calculations until he is supplied with new data by the Astronomer Royal, Sir George Biddell Airy. Airy does not take Adams's claims very seriously, and does not begin searching for Neptune until July 1846.

Terbium discovered by C.G. Mosander in Stockholm and was named after the Swedish town of Ytterby.
1844 Morse sent the first telegraph message.

Liouville finds the first transcendental numbers - numbers that cannot be expressed as the roots of an algebraic equation with rational coefficients.
1845 The German chemist Christian Schönbein discovers nitrocellulose (gun cotton) in an unorthodox way. He wipes up some spilled acid with his wife's cotton apron which explodes and vanishes as it dries!

William McNaught invents the compound steam engine.
1846 Urbain Jean Joseph Leverrier locates Neptune on September 23 1846 after making similar calculations to John Couch Adams. Leverrier receives great recognition for his discovery, while Adams is almost completely ignored. Despite this, the two men become great friends.
1847 The Hungarian doctor Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis shows that childbed fever is contagious. By introducing handwashing between patients on his wards he greatly reduced the number of deaths recorded, but few other doctors took any notice.
1848 Thomson (Lord Kelvin) proposes the absolute temperature scale now named after him.

The American astronomer Maria Mitchell is the first woman elected to the American Academy of Science.
1849 Fizeau measured the velocity of light.
1850 The second law of thermodynamics is stated for the first time by German physicist Rudolf Clausius.

The German botanist Ferdinand Julius Cohn shows that the protoplasm in plant and animal cells is essentially identical.
1851 Earth's rotation demonstrated by Leon Foucault.
1852 Gyroscope invented by Jean Foucalt
1853 George Cayley flew the first true aeroplane.
1854 Logic algebra presented by George Boole.

Riemann's geometry presented by Georg Friedrich Riemann.
1855 The German chemist Robert Bunsen starts using a burner developed by his technician.

This burner quickly becomes known as the Bunsen burner, although credit for its invention should really go to Michael Faraday.
1856 Relation between dielectric and magnetic constant and speed of light found by Wilhelm Eduard Weber and R.Kohlrausch.

Bessemer converter developed by Henry Bessemer for the production of steel.

Neanderthal fossil found in Germany.
1857 Matrices considered by Arthur Cayley
1858 Great Eastern is launched, designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel it was five times larger than anything else afloat.
1859 Theory of Natural Selection proposed by Charles Darwin.
1860 The first fossil bird is found in Germany - it is called Archaeopteryx, meaning "ancient wing" in Greek.
1861 Germ theory proposed by Louis Pasteur.

Rubidium discovered by Robert Bunsen. Caesium discovered by Robert Bunsen.

Thallium discovered by W. Crookes in London.
1862 The Swedish doctor Allvar Gullstrand develops eyeglasses to correct astigmatism and to use when a patient's eye lens is removed in a cataract operation.
1863 TNT invented by J Willibrand.

Indium discovered by F. Reich and H. Richter in Freiberg, Germany.
1864 The distance of the Earth from the sum is calculated by astronomers as 147 million km - only 2.6 million km less than our estimate today.
1865 The German botanist Julius von Sachs discovers that chlorophyll is only found inside the chloroplasts in plant cells.
1866 Dynamite invented by Alfred Nobel.

Mendel wrote a paper on his findings about heredity in plants.
1867 Dating from tree rings is used for the first time.
1868 Cro-Magnon fossil found in France.
1869 Mendeleyev used a periodic table of known elements to correctly predict the properties then undiscovered elements.

Suez Canal is completed.
1870 Benjamin Peirce publishes Linear Associative Algebras at his own expense.

Zenobe T. Gramme perfects the ring armature - the first practical electrical dynamo.
1871 Betti publishes a memoir on topology which contains the "Betti numbers".

Molybdenum discovered by P.J. Hjelm in Uppsala, Sweden.
1872 Group theory applied to geometry by Felix Klein.
1873 Maxwell published "Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism".

Vector analysis introduced by James C.Maxwell.
1874 Cantor established principles of mathematical set theory.
1875 Gallium, one of the elements predicted by Mendeleev in 1871, is discovered by P.E. Lecoq de Boisbaudran in Paris, France.
1876 Telephone invented by Alexander Graham Bell.
1877 Four stroke internal combustion engine invented by Nikolaus Otto.

Moons of Mars discovered by Asaph Hall.

Edison invented the phonograph.
1878 It is discovered that it is dissolved nitrogen in the blood of people working under pressure that causes the bends. The French physiologist Paul Bert suggests that if the pressure around the diver is lowered gradually the bends will not be a problem.

Ytterbium discovered by J.C.G. de Marignac in Geneva, Switzerland.
1879 Electric light bulb invented by Thomas Edison.

Wundt established the first laboratory for psychology experiments.

Samarium discovered by P.E. Lecoq.

Scandium discovered by L.F. Nilson.
1880 The German bacteriologist Robert Koch starts using solid cultures - gelatin - to grow bacteria.

Louis Pasteur develops his germ theory of disease.

Gadolinium discovered by J.C. Galissard in Geneva, Switzerland.
1881 First colour photograph taken by Frederic Ives.
1882 Lindemann proved that pi is transcendental.

Edison created the first large power station in NYC
1883 Wroblewski and Olszewski first produced liquid oxygen.
1884 The prime meridian is set through Greenwich, England.

The first steam turbine generator for making electricity is developed and patented by Charles Parsons.
1885 First petrol driven car takes to the road, designed by Karl Benz.

Eastman invented the box camera.

Hertz discovered the photoelectric effect.

Balmer discovered spectral lines of hydrogen.

Neodymium discovered by Baron Auer von Weisbach.
1886 Germanium discovered by Clemens Winkler.

Dysprosium discovered by P.E. Lecoq de Boisbaudran in Paris, France.

Gadolinium isolated by P.E. Lecoq de Boisbaudran in Paris, France.
1887 Mendelson and Morley conduct experiment showing no evidence for the existence of an "ether".
1888 Hertz discovered radio waves, verifying Maxwell's prediction of electromagnetic waves.

Edison invented the kinetoscope.
1889 Hollerith invented the first calculating machine, used punch cards.
1890 The English geologist Arthur Holmes uses radioactivity to date the Earth from rocks. He finds it is 4.6 billion years old.

In Germany, Emil von Behring develops a vaccine against tetanus and diphtheria.

William Halsted, an American surgeon, introduces the practice of wearing rubber gloves during surgery.
1891 Zip fastener invented by Whitcombe Judson. "Java Man" discovered in Indonesia.
1892 Argon discovered by William Ramsay.

Diesel engine invented by Rudolf Diesel.

Dewar discovered that a double-walled bottle with a vacuum layer insulates the contents from heat flow.

In America, William Burroughs produces an adding-subtracting machine with a printer.
1893 Pearson publishes the first in a series of 18 papers, written over the next 18 years, which introduce a number of fundamental concepts to the study of statistics. These papers contain contributions to regression analysis, the correlation coefficient and includes the chi-square test of statistical significance.
1894 The fossil remains of an early human are found in Java by Dutch scientist Marie Eugène Dubois. Dubois calls his discovery "Pithecanthropus erectus", but it is now known as "Homo erectus".
1895 X-rays discovered by Wilhelm Rontgen.

Marconi invented antenna and wireless telegraph (short distance).
1896 Swedish chemist Svante Arrhenius links the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere with global temperatures and suggests that the ice ages were the result of low carbon dioxide levels.

Antoine-Henri Becquerel discovers rays produced by uranium affect photographic plates - the first scientific observation of natural radioactivity. X-rays are used in medicine to help set broken bones.

Marconi increased range of wireless telegraph to 1.6km.
1897 Radium discovered by Pierre and Marie Currie.

Electron discovered by Sir Joseph Thomson.

Marconi increased range of wireless telegraph to 29 km; first ship-to-shore message.
1898 Neon discovered by William Ramsay and Morris Travers.
1899 Alpha and Beta rays discovered by Ernest Rutherford.

J J Thomson measures the charge on the electron, and proves that it carries the same amount of charge as the hydrogen ions in electrolysis.
1900 Radon discovered by Friedrich Dorn. First public awareness of Mendel's findings in genetics, when his 1865-1866 papers were found.

Freud published "The Interpretation of Dreams".

Finlay discovered that yellow fever is spread by mosquitos.

Planck proposed that energy can only be absorbed or emitted by matter in discrete amounts (quanta).

Paul Karl Ludwig Drude shows that moving electrons conduct electricity in metals.

Paul Ulrich Villard is the first person to observe gamma radiation.

Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin builds his first rigid airship.
1901 Marconi receives the first transatlantic signal from Cornwall to Newfoundland.
1902 Discovery of Tyrannosaurus Rex . Kennelly (U.S.) and Heaviside (England) independently discovered the ionosphere
1903 On this day Orville Wright made the first controlled powered flight. He flew a distance of 120 feet, lasting 12 seconds.

The botanist De Vries discovered mutations in plants
1904 Theory of radioactivity put forward by Rutherford and Frederick Soddy.

Fleming invented vacuum tube diode.

Genetics experiments by Thomas Morgan, discovery of sex-linked mutations (among a group of fruit flies with normal red or unusual white eyes, all of the white-eyed offspring were male).
1905 Einstein published papers on Brownian motion, the photoelectric effect, and the special theory of relativity.
1906 Third law of thermodynamics proposed by Hermann Nernst.

Triode valve invented by Lee De Forest.

Proof of Earth's molten core proposed by Richard Oldham.
1907 Einstein publishes his principle of equivalence, in which says that gravitational acceleration is indistinguishable from acceleration caused by mechanical forces. It is a key ingredient of general relativity.

The first free flight of a helicopter was made by Paul Cornu at Lisieux, France.

Lutetium discovered by G. Urbain in Paris, France, and, independently, by C. James at the University of New Hampshire, USA.
1908 Geiger counter invented by Hans Geiger and Rutherford.

The "Tunguska event" - major damage to a forest region in Siberia caused by a comet or meteorite.

Ford produced the Model T automobile.

Wegener proposed theory of continental drift.
1909 Louis Bleriot crosses the English Channel.
1910 First antibacterial agent, Salvarsan for the treatment of syphilis, specified by Paul Ehrlich.
1911 Ernest Rutherford discovers the atomic nucleus.

Gyrocompass invented by Elmer Sperry.

Dutch physicist Heike Kammerlingh discovered superconductivity.
1912 X-ray crystallography discovered by Max von Laue.

Pickard invented the crystal diode and crystal detector.

Titanic sinks on it's maiden voyage, 1513 lives lost.

The term "vitamin" is used for the first time.

Max von Laue shows that X-rays are a form of electromagnetic radiation.
1913 Model of the atom proposed by Niels Bohr.

Vitamin A isolated by Elmer McCollum.

Edison invented motion pictures with sound.

Ford added the assembly line to his automobile plant.
1914 Proton discovered by Ernest Rutherford.

The Armoured Tank was invented by Ernest Swinton.
1915 General relativity presented by Albert Einstein.

Lusitania sunk without warning by a German submarine, 1198 people died.
1916 Earth's molten core discovered Albert Michelson.

Lewis proposed the idea of covalent bonds.
1917 Kakeya poses his problem on minimising areas.
1918 The first mass spectrometer is built by English physicist Francis Aston. He uses it to identify isotopes in a number of different elements.
1919 Eddington recorded data on the sun's gravitational deflection of starlight during a solar eclipse, confirming Einstein's general theory of relativity
1920 American physicist William Draper Harkins suggests the existence of the neutron, a neutral particle in the nucleus.

Evidence for the existence of the neutron will not actually be obtained until 1932.
1921 The American chemist Thomas Midgley discovers that tetraethyl lead prevents "knock" in car engines - the beginning of lead compounds being added to petrol.

A team of scientists extract insulin from human pancreases and start experiments on dogs to try and develop a treatment for diabetes.

The first air to air refuelling took place when Wesley May transfered from the wing of one plane to that of another with a five gallon can of fuel.
1922 Elmer McCollum discovers vitamin D in cod liver oil and uses it for treating rickets.
1923 Freud published "The Ego and the Id".

Development of the diptheria vaccine.

Production of insulin to treat diabetes.

Hubble estimated the distance from the Milky Way Galaxy to the Andromeda Galaxy.

Hafnium discovered by D. Coster and G.C. von Hevesey in Copenhagen, Denmark.
1924 Discovery of Australopithecus Africanus, its human-sized brain too large to be that of an ape, but having the canine teeth of a gorilla.

De Broglie proposed that all matter has wave properties.
1925 Pauli proposed the Exclusion Principle, no two electrons in an atom can have the same set of quantum numbers.

Scopes fired from biology teaching position for teaching evolution.

Vitamin B isolated by Joseph Goldberger.

Rhenium discovered by W. Noddack, O. Berg and Ida Tacke in Berlin, Germany.
1926 Wave mechanics introduced by Erwin Schrodinger.

Television invented by John Logie Baird.

Born proposed the statistical interpretation of the wave equation.

Goddard launched the first liquid-fueled rocket.
1927 Heisenberg proposed the Uncertainty Principle, we cannot simultaneously determine the position and momentum of a subatomic particle.

Experiment by Davisson and Germer, and simultaneous experiment by G. P. Thompson, proved the wave behaviour of electrons.

Dirac developed the relativistic quantum theory.

Big bang theory introduced.
1928 Penicillin discovered by Alexander Fleming.

Vitamin C discovered by Charles Glen King and Albert Szent-Gyorgi.
1929 Hubble discovered that the galaxies are moving away from each other, causing an expansion of the universe.

Robert Van de Graaff invents the first particle accelerator, known today as the Van de Graaff accelerator.
1930 Tombaugh discovered Pluto.

Jet engine invented by Frank Whittle.
1931 Anderson discovered the positron.

Cyclotron invented by Ernest O Lawrence, the first one measures just 100mm in diameter.

The structure of Vitamin A discovered by Paul Karrer.
1932 James Chadwick discovers the neutron.

The positron is discovered by Carl Anderson.

The wind tunnel was developed by Ford Motor Company.

Vitamin C isolated by Charles Glen King.
1933 Electron microscope invented by Ernst Ruska.

Vitamin C synthesised by adeus Reichstein.
1934 Wernher von Braun, a German engineer, develops a rocket powered by liquid fuel. It reaches a height of 2.4km.

Nylon patented by the inventor Wallace Carothers.
1935 General Electric Corp. introduces fluorescent lights.
1936 Catalytic cracking is developed for refining petroleum.

The Supermarine Spitfire makes it's first flight on 5 March.
1937 Discovery of the muon.

Alan Turing published the mathematical theory of computing.

Hindenburg bursts into flames on approach to it's mooring.
1938 Hahn, Strassmann, Meitner and Frisch discovered nuclear fission.

Bethe hypothesized that nuclear fusion is the source of energy in stars.
1939 Discovery of Kirlian photography -- electrical "auras" surrounding living specimens.

Nylon marketed by Du Pont.
1940 Igor Sikorsky invents the helicopter.
1941 Glenn Seaborg isolates plutonium.
1942 Enrico Fermi produced the first nuclear chain reaction in an experiment. Establishment of the Manhattan Project to develop an atomic bomb
1943 The first kidney dialysis machine is developed by the Dutch doctor Wilhelm Kolff.

Jacques Yves Cousteau invents the aqualung and opens up the exploration of life under the sea.
1944 DDT is marketed.
1945 The first atomic bomb was detonated at Hiroshima, Japan, about 70,000 people were killed instantly; about 30,000 more people died within several weeks
1946 Gamow proposed the Big Bang hypothesis.

The University of Pennsylvania developed the ENIAC computer, containing 18,000 vacuum tubes
1947 W. F. Libby invented radiocarbon dating.

Discovery of the pion, predicted by Yukawa in 1935.

The Bell X1 was the first aircraft to break through the sound barrier flown by Captain Charles E Yeager.
1948 First transistor produced by John Bardeen, Walter Brattain and William Shockley.

Quantum Electrodynamics proposed by Richard Feyman, Seymour Schwinger and Shin'chiro Tomonaga.
1949 Introduction of the first commercial passenger jet, the DeHaviland Comet.
1950 The Dutch astronomer Jan Hendrik Oort proposes that a great cloud of cometary material and dust surrounds the solar system outside the orbit of Pluto. From this Oort cloud (as it becomes known) materials falls towards the Sun from time to time, and we see it as a comet.
1951 Experimental Breeder Reactor in Idaho (USA) is the first nuclear reactor to generate electricity.

First commercially available computer, the UNIVAC 1. Franklin discovered nucleic acids (RNA and DNA), helical shape.

Hydrogen bomb detonated.

First transmission of colour TV pictures.
1952 James Bonner shows that mitochondria are involved in the reactions of cellular respiration.

A calf is produced using semen that had been frozen before it was used.

The first accident at a nuclear reactor occurs - a technician makes an error at the Chalk River reactor in Canada and the nuclear core explodes.

The American doctor and epidemiologist Jonas Salk develops a polio vaccine which is used in a mass inoculation programme which will start in 1954.
1953 Watson and Crick discovered DNA has double helix, composed of ATCG bases occuring in pairs (A with T, and C with G). Miller produced amino acids from inorganic compounds and sparks.

Radioactive fluorine dating proved that the "Piltdown Man" artifact was a hoax.

Raytheon Corporation produces the microwave oven.

Jerrold Zacharias built the first working caesium clock at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
1954 The nuclear powered submarine Nautilus is launched.
1955 Atomically generated power first used in the US.

Hovercraft patented by Christopher Cockerell.
1956 Discovery of the neutrino, predicted by Pauli in 1930.

Fortran developed by John Backus working at IBM.
1957 Sputnik becomes the first man-made object to orbit the Earth.

Tunnel diode invented by Leo Esaki at Sony.
1958 Van Allen radiation belts discovered by James Van Allen. U.S.

Congress established NASA.

Jack Kilby at Texas Instruments completes building of the first integrated circuit containing 5 components.
1959 The USSR Lunar 2 probe becomes the first man-made object to reach a celestial body.

The hovercraft is launched in Southampton, invented by Christopher Cockerell.
1960 Maiman invented the ruby laser. Javan invented the helium-neon laser.

Goodall studied chimpanzees in Tanzania.

Development and approval of the birth control pill.
1961 Yuri Gagarin in Vostok 1 is the first human to travel in space. Alan Shepard becomes the first American to travel in space.

Lawrencium first artificially created by a team led by American chemist Albert Ghiorso.
1962 First US orbital spaceflight is made by John Glenn in Friendship 7.

Fractal images invented by Benoit Mandlebrot.
1963 Valentina Tereshkova is the first woman in space.

Vine and Matthews discovered that rock layers with particular magnetic orientations, indicating reversals of the earth's magnetic field, are symmetrical about the mid-oceanic ridge, indicating that new crust is created at the ridge.

Gell-Mann proposed protons and neutrons are made of smaller particles (quarks).
1964 Quark discovered by Murray Gell-Mann and George Zweig.

Discovery of a quasar.

Unmanned U.S. spacecraft transmitted television pictures of the moon before hitting the surface.

Wilson and Penzias discovered the background microwave radiation of the universe.
1965 First spacewalk is made by Alexei Leonov from Voskhod 2.

Word processor invented by IBM.
1966 The first unmanned soft landing on the moon (Soviet Union).
1967 Pulsars discovered by Jocelyn Bell and Antony Hewish.

Salam and Weinberg developed a model to unite electromagnetism and the weak nuclear force.

U.S. astronauts Grissom, White and Chaffee killed during ground test; Apollo program delayed.
1968 First manned flight around the moon is made by Frank Borman, James Lovell and William Anders in Apollo 8.
1969 Apollo 11 crew make the first human landing on the moon. Neil Armstrong steps on the moon.

Concorde made it's first flight.
1970 Floppy disc invented by IBM.

Apollo 13 moon landing cancelled due to severe malfunctions.
1971 Pocket calculator invented by Texas instruments.

Liquid Crystal Display invented by Hoffmann-LaRoche Laboratories.
1972 Eugene Cernan and Jack Schmitt in Appolo 17 are the last to land on the Moon.
1973 U.S. launched Skylab space station.
1974 Discovery of "Lucy" in Africa, an almost complete homonid skelton over 3 million years old, only 3 and a half feet tall but having adult teeth, a small brain, walked upright.
1975 First unmanned soft landing on Venus (Soviet Union). The first U.S.-Soviet space docking (Apollo and Soyuz).

Invention of the CAT scanner (computerized axial tomography).

Home video invented by Matsushita, JVC and Sony.
1976 Cosmic string theory was introduced.
1977 Voyager spacecraft launched; contained recording of earth sounds, including music and greetings in 55 Earth languages.

Submarine "Alvin" explored midoceanic ridge, discovered chemosynthetic life.
1978 Mori proves the "Hartshorne conjecture", that projective spaces are the only smooth complete algebraic varieties with ample tangent bundles.

Yuet Wai Kan and A. M. Dozy developed basic mapping techniques to find genes on chromosomes.
1979 First "test tube baby" from artificial insemination.

Voyager 1 and 2 photographed Jupiter.
1980 Voyager 2 photographed Saturn.

Introduction of the the communication protocol that led to the Internet.
1981 Binnig and Rohrer invented the scanning tunneling microscope.

U.S. launched the first space shuttle, Columbia, the first reuseable space vehicle.
1982 First launch of communications satellites into orbit by space shuttle.
1983 Existence of W and Z particles confirmed by CERN.

Pioneer 10 becomes the first spacecraft to leave our Solar System.
1984 cdrom invented by Sony, Fujitsu and Philips.

First retrieval of malfunctioning satellites, repair and relaunch by space shuttle.

Discovery of ozone hole over Antarctica.
1985 Genetic fingerprinting invented by Alec Jeffreys.
1986 Voyager 2 photographed Uranus; discovered moons.

Development of the first high temperature superconductors.

Soviet Union launched Mir space station.

U.S. space shuttle Challenger exploded on launch, killing 7 astronauts.
1987 A fossilised dinosaur egg is discovered which X-rays show contains the oldest known embryo - 150 million years old.

A team lead by Ching-Wu Chu at the University of Houston makes a material which is superconducting at the temperature of liquid nitrogen - minus 196°C.Herbert Naarmann and N Theophilou from BASF in Germany develop a form of plastic polymer that is in some ways a better conductor of electricity than copper is.

A crime suspect is convicted on the evidence of genetic fingerprinting in the UK.

Working with a team of American and Finnish scientists, David Page and his colleagues find a single gene on the Y chromosome which seems to control the sequence of events which leads to an embryo developing testes instead of ovaries - in other words, a gene for maleness.
1988 The first successful transplant of a liver and small intestine is carried out.

Chemists estimate that there are 10 million known chemical compounds and that 400 000 more are synthesised or discovered each year.

A patent is granted to cover a genetically engineered mouse.
1989 Voyager 2 photographed Neptune; discovered moons.

An asteroid came relatively close to colliding with the earth.
1990 Hubble Space Telescope launched; optical defect discovered.
1991 Tracey, the first transgenic sheep, is born. She has human genes which enable her to produce human protein in her milk. This protein is extracted and can be used to help relieve the symptoms of people suffering from cystic fibrosis and emphysema.

In Japan Sumio Iijima of NEC Corporation discovers carbon nanotubes, related to buckminsterfullerene and known as "bucky tubes". They may replace the silicon chip in the future.
1992 The risk of carbon dioxide buildup and global warming is recognised during the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. Countries from all over the world meet up with the objective of stabilising green house gas concentrations at a level that will prevent interference with the world climate. It results in emissions limits being accepted - but with a very long time before these limits have to be met.

The first 'xenotransplant' from one type of animal to another involving genetically engineered tissue (liver) is carried out successfully.
1993 Andrew Wiles proves Fermat's last theorem, which had been first proposed in 1637
1994 Hubble Space Telescope confirmed existence of a black hole.

Astronomers observed comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 (S-L 9) colliding with Jupiter.
1995 Discovery of the top quark at Fermilab.
1996 A team led by Leland H. Hartwell decipher the genome of baker′s yeast, the first organism with a nucleus to have its genome deciphered.
1997 Microscopic analysis of meteorite led to belief in ancient life on Mars. Pathfinder vehicle studied and photographed Mars.
1998 Thomas Hales proves Kepler's problem on sphere packing.
1999 Breitling Orbiter 3 Gondola becomes the first balloon to fly around the world nonstop.
2000 The first cloned pigs are born.
2001 The complete genetic code of the laboratory mouse is published by Craig Ventner and colleagues.
2002 Manindra Agrawal develops an algorithm that can be used to determine if any number is a prime number.
2003 Complete sequence of human Y-chromosome is published.

Space shuttle Colombia disintegrates on re-entry killing all seven crew members.
2004 SpaceShipOne makes it′s two flights beyond 100km in 14 days winning the Ansari X Prize.
2005 Kyoto Protocol comes into force and is ratified by 141 nations.
2006 North Korea allegedly tests its first nuclear device.
2007 Russia tests the largest conventional weapon ever, the Father of all bombs.
2008 The Large Hadron Collider at CERN, described as the biggest scientific experiment in history is powered up in Geneva, Switzerland.
2009 First lunar impact of the Centaur and LCROSS spacecrafts as part of NASA′s Lunar Precursor Robotic Program.
2011 The Boeing 787 Dreamliner receives certification from the EASA and the FAA.

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