Today in Science

Births 1928 - Desmond Morris, British zoologist Deaths 1877 - Johann Christian Poggendorff, German physicist 1966 - Homi J. Bhabha, Indian physicist
Births 1840 - Ernst Abbe, German physicist 1857 - Andrija MohoroviÄiÄ, Croatian seismologist 1872 - Paul Langevin, French physicist 1876 - Otto Diels, German chemist and Nobel Prize laureate 1907 - Hideki Yukawa, Japanese physicist and Nobel Prize laureate 1918 - Gertrude B. Elion, American scientist and Nobel Prize laureate 1919 - Hans Hass, Austrian zoologist 1929 - John Charles Polanyi, Canadian chemist and Nobel Prize laureate Deaths 1937 - Orso Mario Corbino, Italian physicist 1971 - Fritz Feigl, Austria-born chemist 1988 - Charles Glen King, American biochemist
Events 2003 - Last successful contact with Pioneer 10. Births 1561 - Francis Bacon, English philosopher 1592 - Pierre Gassendi, French philosopher, mathematician, and scientist 1796 - Karl Claus, Russian chemist 1903 - Fritz Houtermans, Polish physicist 1908 - Lev Davidovich Landau, Russian physicist and Nobel Prize laureate 1936 - Alan J. Heeger, American chemist and Nobel Prize laureate Deaths 1767 - Johann Gottlob Lehmann, German minerologist and geologist 1779 - Jeremiah Dixon, English surveyor and astronomer 1840 - Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, German anthropologist
Births 1912 - Konrad Emil Bloch, German-born biochemist and Nobel Prize laureate Deaths 1926 - Camillo Golgi, Italian physician
Events 1969 - The first pulsar is discovered. Births 1775 - André-Marie Ampère, French physicist 1910 - Joy Adamson, Austrian naturalist and writer 1931 - David Lee, American physicist and Nobel Prize laureate Deaths 1973 - Lorenz Böhler, Austrian physician 2005 - Miriam Louisa Rothschild, British zoologist, entomologist, and author
Events 2006 - The New Horizons probe is launched by NASA on the first mission to Pluto. Births 1851 - Jacobus Kapteyn, Dutch astronomer Deaths 1878 - Henri Victor Regnault French physicist and chemist 1954 - Theodor Kaluza, German scientist
Events 1977 - Scientists identify a previously unknown bacterium (Legionella pneumophila, above) as the cause of the mysterious Legionnaires’ disease. Births 1856 - Daniel Hale Williams, African-American surgeon 1892 - Paul Rostock, German surgeon 1918 - Gustave Gingras, French Canadian physician Deaths 1878 - Antoine César Becquerel, French physicist 1995 - Adolf Butenandt, German chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
Births 1501 - Leonhart Fuchs, German physician and botanist 1560 - Gaspard Bauhin, Swiss botanist 1761 - James Hall, Scottish geologist Deaths 1705 - John Ray, English naturalist 1884 - Hermann Schlegel, German ornithologist 1997 - Clyde Tombaugh, American astronomer 2005 - Albert Schatz, American microbiologist
Events 1909 - Ernest Shackleton’s expedition finds the magnetic South Pole. 2003 - Space Shuttle Columbia takes off for mission STS-107. It disintegrates 16 days later on re-entry. Births 1477 - Johannes Schöner, German astronomer and cartographer (above) 1838 - Franz Brentano, German philosopher and psychologist 1875 - Leonor Michaelis, German biochemist 1932 - Dian Fossey, American zoologist Deaths 1547 - Johannes Schöner, German astronomer and cartographer (above) 1856 - Thaddeus William Harris, American naturalist 1967 - Robert J. Van de Graaff, American nuclear physicist 2006 -…
Events 2005 - ESA’s SMART-1 lunar orbiter discovers elements such as calcium, aluminum, silicon, iron, and other surface elements on the moon. Births 1842 - Josef Breuer, Austrian psychologist 1885 - Lorenz Böhler, Austrian physician 1895 - Artturi Ilmari Virtanen, Finnish chemist and Nobel Prize laureate 1908 - Edward Teller, Hungarian-born physicist Death 1804 - Dru Drury, English entomologist
Events 2005 - Landing of the Huygens probe on Saturn’s moon Titan. Births 1684 - Johann Matthias Hase, German scientist 1806 - Matthew Fontaine Maury American oceanographer Deaths 1742 - Edmond Halley, English scientist 1905 - Ernst Abbe, German physicist 2001 - Burkhard Heim, German physicist
Events 1610 - Galileo Galilei discovers Callisto, 4th moon of Jupiter. Births 1861 - Max Nonne, German neurologist 1864 - Wilhelm Wien, German physicist and Nobel Prize laureate 1927 - Sydney Brenner, South African biologist and Nobel Prize laureate Deaths 1796 - John H. D. Anderson, Scottish scientist and inventor 1906 - Alexander Popov, Russian physicist 1924 - Georg Hermann Quincke, German physicist 1934 - Paul Ulrich Villard, French physicist
Events 1808 - The organizational meeting that led to the creation of the Wernerian Natural History Society is held. 2005 - Deep Impact (space mission) launches from Cape Canaveral on a Delta 2 rocket. Births 1792 - Johan August Arfwedson, Swedish chemist 1797 - Gideon Brecher, Austrian physician 1899 - Paul Hermann Müller, Swiss chemist and Nobel Prize laureate 1905 - James Bennett Griffin, American archaeologist Deaths 1732 - John Horsley, British archaeologist 1997 - Charles B. Huggins, Canadian-born cancer researcher and Nobel Prize laureate 2003 - Dean Amadon, American…
Events 1787 - William Herschel discovers Titania and Oberon, two moons of Uranus. 1922 - First use of insulin to treat diabetes in a human patient. Births 1788 - William Thomas Brande, English chemist 1800 - Anyos Jedlik, Hungarian physicist 1842 - William James, American psychologist and philosopher 1845 - Albert Victor Bäcklund, Swedish physicist 1906 - Albert Hofmann, Swiss chemist 1924 - Roger Guillemin, French neuroendocrinologist and Nobel Prize laureate Deaths 1882 - Theodor Schwann, German physiologist 1968 - Isidor Isaac Rabi, American physicist and Nobel Prize laureate 1991…
Births 1573 - Simon Marius, German astronomer 1638 - Nicolas Steno, Danish geologist 1729 - Lazzaro Spallanzani, Italian biologist 1890 - Grigory Landsberg, Russian physicist 1916 - Sune Bergström, Swedish biochemist and Nobel Prize laureate 1936 - Robert Woodrow Wilson, American physicist and Nobel Prize laureate Deaths 1778 - Carolus Linnaeus, Swedish botanist 1949 - Erich von Drygalski, German geographer, geophysicist, and polar scientist 1951 - Yoshio Nishina, Japanese physicist 1997 - Alexander R. Todd, Baron Todd, Scottish chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
Births 1823 - Johannes Friedrich August von Esmarch, German surgeon 1868 - S. P. L. Sørensen, Danish chemist 1879 - John Broadus Watson, American psychologist 1922 - Har Gobind Khorana, Indian physiologist and Nobel Prize laureate Deaths 1757 - Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle, French scientist 1848 - Caroline Herschel, German-born astronomer 1911 - Edvard Rusjan, Slovene flight pioneer 1918 - Ãmile Reynaud, French scientist 1998 - Kenichi Fukui, Japanese chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
Births 1823 - Alfred Russel Wallace, British naturalist and biologist 1891 - Walther Bothe, German physicist and Nobel Prize laureate 1902 - Carl Rogers, American psychologist 1903 - Igor Kurchatov, Russian physicist 1942 - Stephen Hawking, English theoretical physicist Deaths 1642 - Galileo Galilei, Italian astronomer and scientist 1980 - John Mauchly, American physicist 1997 - Melvin Calvin, American chemist and Nobel Prize laureate 2002 - Alexander Prochorow, Russian physicist and Nobel Prize laureate
Events 1610 - Galileo Galilei observes the four largest moons (the Galilean moons) of Jupiter for the first time. Births 1834 - Johann Philipp Reis, German physicist and inventor 1925 - Gerald Durrell, British naturalist 1941 - John E. Walker, English chemist and Nobel Prize laureate Deaths 1786 - Jean-Ãtienne Guettard, French physician and scientist 1878 - François-Vincent Raspail, French chemist 1893 - Jožef Stefan, Slovenian physicist 1984 - Alfred Kastler, French physicist and Nobel Prize laureate 1998 - Vladimir Prelog, Croatian chemist and Nobel Prize laureate
Events 1838 - Samuel Morse first successfully tests the electrical telegraph. Births 1714 - Percivall Pott, English physician 1795 - Anselme Payen, French chemist 1822 - Heinrich Schliemann, German archaeologist 1920 - John Maynard Smith, English biologist 1932 - Stuart A. Rice, American chemist 1944 - Rolf M. Zinkernagel, Swiss immunologist and Nobel Prize laureate Deaths 1689 - Seth Ward, English mathematician and astronomer 1731 - Ãtienne François Geoffroy, French chemist 1884 - Gregor Johann Mendel, Austrian geneticist (above) 1945 - Vladimir Vernadsky, Russian mineralogist 1990…
Events 1896 - An Austrian newspaper reports that Wilhelm Roentgen has discovered a type of radiation later known as X-rays. 1972 - Richard Nixon orders the development of a space shuttle program. 2005 - Eris, the largest known dwarf planet in the solar system, is discovered. Births 1865 - Julio Garavito Armero, Colombian astronomer 1874 - Joseph Erlanger, American physiologist and Nobel Prize laureate 1879 - Hans Eppinger, Austrian physician 1906 - Kathleen Kenyon, English archaeologist Deaths 1904 - Karl Alfred von Zittel, German palaeontologist 1922 - Ernest Shackleton, Irish explorer…