This Day in Science History

[astromarks]

Has anyone tried to reproduced the experiments of the pionners for fun?

 

[alokmohan]

What possibly is important about it?

 

[yevaud]

Beats me.<br /><br />The next month's worth of Science History to be posted in a few days, btw. I have little time of late, so I am trying to do it one month's worth at a time. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><em>Differential Diagnosis:  </em>"<strong><em>I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are</em></strong>."<br /> </p> </div>

 

[Smersh]

On 11 January 1787, Sir William Herschel discovered Titania, the first moon of Uranus.<br />Source - http://www.esa.int/esaSC/SEMXNEQ3K3E_index_0.html<br /><br />Some sources give the discovery date as 13 March, 1787, along with Oberon, another Uranus moon, but I would think the ESA source is pretty reliable so I'm gonna run with that! <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <h1 style="margin:0pt;font-size:12px">----------------------------------------------------- </h1><p><font color="#800000"><em>Lady Nancy Astor: "Winston, if you were my husband, I'd poison your tea."<br />Churchill: "Nancy, if you were my wife, I'd drink it."</em></font></p><p><font color="#0000ff"><strong>Website / forums </strong></font></p> </div>

 

[search]

February 27th in History<br />1879: Two American chemists announce the discovery of saccharin<br />1933: German parliament building (Reichstag) destroyed by fire<br />1948: The Communist Party takes control in Czechoslovakia<br />1991: An allied ceasefire in the Gulf War begins, Iraqi forces withdraw from Kuwait.<br /><br /><br />February 27th birthdays<br />1807: Henry Longfellow, American poet<br />1902: John Steinbeck, American writer<br />1930: Joanne Woodward, British actress<br />1932: Elizabeth Taylor, American actress<br /><br />February 27,<br /><br />Year 837 in History<br /><br />Event:<br />15th recorded perihelion passage of Halley's Comet <br /><br />http://www.brainyhistory.com/days/february_27.html

 

[why06]

You know I haven't seen anything posted here in awhile. Or did we cover all 365 days already. <br /><br />Well its a nice archive <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" /> Kudos for all who contributed. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <div>________________________________________ <br /></div><div><ul><li><font color="#008000"><em>your move...</em></font></li></ul></div> </div>

 

[yevaud]

Unfortunately, my schedule became vastly more complicated last Fall, and I just plain haven't had a few days free to catch up on this. At some point, I will complete it. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><em>Differential Diagnosis:  </em>"<strong><em>I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are</em></strong>."<br /> </p> </div>

 

[why06]

no worries,<br /><br />Appreciate the hard-work, This should be a group project that everyone should participate in, who knows maybe I'll post a few historic moments also... though I doubt it. Im kinda busy too. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <div>________________________________________ <br /></div><div><ul><li><font color="#008000"><em>your move...</em></font></li></ul></div> </div>

 

[majornature]

<b><font color="orange">April 11th in history</font>/b><br /><br /><b>Percy Lavon Julian: Born April 11th, 1899. Died April 19th, 1975</b><br /><br /><b><font color="black">Life</font>/b><br /><br /><font color="yellow"><b>Percy Lavon Julian was born on April 11, 1899, in Montgomery, Alabama. With the help of his parents who possessed backgrounds in teaching and believed that education would led their children to better lives, Julian was able to overcome racial bigotry and segregation. He graduated in 1920 with a bachelor’s of science degree from DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana. He received his master’s of science degree in 1923 and his doctoral degree in 1931, both from the University of Vienna (Austria). Upon graduation with his Ph.D. in natural products chemistry, Julian taught at Howard University (1931), in Washington, D.C., and then at DePauw University (1932-1936). <br /><br />One of his first scientific successes was in 1935, when Julian, along with Josef Pikl, was able to totally synthesize physostigmine (also known as esterine), a drug that affects the parasympathetic nervous system. The drug was developed to treat glaucoma, a disorder of the optic nerves of the eyes. <br /><br />When Julian did not receive a professorship at DePauw because of his racial heritage, he left in 1936 to become the Director of Research at the Soy Products Division of the Glidden Paint Company in Chicago, Illinois. Julian designed the first U.S. manufacturing plant for the production of industrial grade soy protein. The team of chemists under Julian’s direction produced numerous household and industrial products such as latex paint, high-protein livestock feed, and plastics. One of his most important discoveries was a soy protein that could be used as foams for firefighting. In fact, these fire-extinguishing foams saved thousands of American lives during World War II. <br /><br />While at Glidden, Julian produced the artificial female hormone progesterone. His</b></font></b></b> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <font size="2" color="#14ea50"><strong><font size="1">We are born.  We live.  We experiment.  We rot.  We die.  and the whole process starts all over again!  Imagine That!</font><br /><br /><br /><img id="6e5c6b4c-0657-47dd-9476-1fbb47938264" style="width:176px;height:247px" src="http://sitelife.space.com/ver1.0/Content/images/store/14/4/6e5c6b4c-0657-47dd-9476-1fbb47938264.Large.jpg" alt="blog post photo" width="276" height="440" /><br /></strong></font> </div>

 

[petepan]

MAY 3 - BIRTHS<br /><br />Steven Weinberg <br /> <br /> Born 3 May 1933 <br />American nuclear physicist who in 1979 shared the Nobel Prize for Physics with Sheldon Lee Glashow and Abdus Salam for work in formulating the electroweak theory, which explains the unity of electromagnetism with the weak nuclear force. <br /><br />The First Three Minutes: A Modern View of the Origin of the Universe, by Steven Weinberg <br /><br />Alfred Kastler <br />Born 3 May 1902; died 7 Jan 1984. <br />French physicist who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1966 for his discovery and development of methods for observing Hertzian resonances within atoms. This research facilitated the greater understanding of the structure of the atom by studying the radiations that atoms emit when excitated by light and radio waves. He developed a method called "optical pumping" which caused atoms in a sample substance to enter higher energy states. This idea was an important predecessor to the development of masers and the lasers which utilized the light energy that was reemitted when excited atoms released the extra energy obtained from optical pumping. <br /><br />Sir George Paget Thomson <br />Born 3 May 1892; died 10 Sep 1975. <br />English physicist who was the joint recipient (with Clinton J. Davisson of the U.S.) of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1937 for demonstrating that electrons undergo diffraction, a behaviour peculiar to waves that is widely exploited in determining the atomic structure of solids and liquids. He was the son of Sir J.J. Thomson who discovered the electron as a particle. <br /><br /><br />Karl Abraham <br /> <br /> Born 3 May 1877; died 25 Dec 1925. <br />German psychoanalyst who studied the role of childhood sexual trauma in relation to the symptoms of mental illness. He was initiated into psychoanalysis by Carl Gustav Jung (1904). He first met Freud in 1907, and subsequently became one of his most reliable collaborators. Covering a wide range, Abraham's papers include work on depression, m

 

[dragon04]

I really enjoy this thread Yev. What a brilliant idea it is.<br /><br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <em>"2012.. Year of the Dragon!! Get on the Dragon Wagon!".</em> </div>

 

[yevaud]

I'm waiting for several quality days off to finish off the remainder. Hasn't happened yet.<br /><br />I am just too damned maxed out. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><em>Differential Diagnosis:  </em>"<strong><em>I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are</em></strong>."<br /> </p> </div>

 

[dragon04]

<b>Brook Taylor</b><br /><br />Born 18 Aug 1685; died 29 Dec 1731<br />British mathematician, best known the Taylor's series, a method for expanding functions into infinite series. In 1708, Taylor produced a solution to the problem of the centre of oscillation. His Methodus incrementorum directa et inversa (1715; “Direct and Indirect Methods of Incrementationâ€) introduced what is now called the calculus of finite differences. Using this, he was the first to express mathematically the movement of a vibrating string on the basis of mechanical principles. Methodus also contained Taylor's theorem, later recognized (1772) by Lagrange as the basis of differential calculus. A gifted artist, Taylor also wrote on basic principles of perspective (1715) containing the first general treatment of the principle of vanishing points.<br /><br /><b>B.F. Skinner</b><br /><br />Died 18 Aug 1990 (born 20 Mar 1904)<br />B(urrhus) F(rederick) Skinner was an American psychologist whose pioneering work in experimental psychology promoted behaviorism, shaping behavior through positive and negative reinforcement and demonstrated operant conditioning. The "Skinner box" he used in experiments from 1930 remains famous. To investigate the learning processes of animals, he observed their behaviour in a simple box with a lever which, when activated by the animal, would give a reward (or punishment). The reward, such as pellets of food or water, acts as a primary reinforcer. He observed the behaviour of animals adapted to utilize the opportunity for a reward. He extended his theories to the behaviour of humans, as a form of social engineering.<br /><br /><b>Andre-Jacques Garnerin</b><br /><br />Died 18 Aug 1823 (born 31 Jan 1769)<br />French aeronaut, the first person to use a parachute regularly and successfully. He perfected the parachute and made jumps from greater altitudes than had been possible before. On 22 October 1797, at age 28, Garnerin made his first jump above the Parc Monceau in Paris. He drop <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <em>"2012.. Year of the Dragon!! Get on the Dragon Wagon!".</em> </div>

 

[dragon04]

<font color="yellow"><b>Births</b></font><br /><br /><b>Jerome L. Murray</b><br /><br />American inventor of the peristaltic pump that made open-heart surgery possible. It met the need to pump blood without damaging the cells through a method of expansion and contraction that imitates the way that peristalsis moves the contents of the digestive tract. In addition, the pump was adapted for kidney dialysis and for food processing (to pump soup into cans without crushing the peas or the celery). He decided to invent the airplane boarding ramp when on a day in 1951 at the Miami International Airport he saw passengers having to walk in the rain to the terminal. In all, he held 75 patents including a television antenna rotator, electric carving knife, high-speed dentist drill, power car seat and an audible pressure cooker. <br /><br /><b>Valentin Petrovich Glushko</b><br /><br />Soviet rocket scientist who was a pioneer developer of rocket engines (1946-74). From 1929, he worked in Leningrad in GDL - the Gas Dynamics Laboratory, the military rocket research organization, founded in 1921. He worked with renowned rocket designer Sergey Korolyov (1932-1966). In Aug 1957, they successfully launched the first intercontinental ballistic missile and in October of the same year, sent the first artificial satellite, Sputnik I, into orbit. He became chief designer for the Soviet space program in 1974, helping to oversee development of the Mir space station. During his life, he designed the most succesessful rocket engines in the Soviet space program.<br /><br /><font color="yellow"><b>Deaths</b></font><br /><br /><b>Sir Fred Hoyle</b><br /><br />Died 20 Aug 2001 (born 24 June 1915)<br />English mathematician and astronomer, best known as the foremost proponent and defender of the steady-state theory of the universe. This theory holds both that the universe is expanding and that matter is being continuously created to keep the mean density of matter in space constant. He bec <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <em>"2012.. Year of the Dragon!! Get on the Dragon Wagon!".</em> </div>

 

[MeteorWayne]

Voyager and the phonograph.<br />A great day in history! <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><font color="#000080"><em><font color="#000000">But the Krell forgot one thing John. Monsters. Monsters from the Id.</font></em> </font></p><p><font color="#000080">I really, really, really, really miss the "first unread post" function</font><font color="#000080"> </font></p> </div>

 

[dragon04]

<font color="yellow"><b>Births</b></font><br /><br /><b>Denton A. Cooley</b><br /><br />Dr. Denton A(rthur) Cooley is an American surgeon and heart-transplant pioneer who was the first to implant an artificial heart in a human. In 1960s he performed delicate surgery on the hearts of infants with congenital heart disease, and was the first surgeon to successfully remove pulmonary embolisms. On 3 May 1968, Cooley performed his first human heart transplant. On 4 Apr 1969, because no donor heart was available for a dying 47-year-old patient with diseased heart muscle, he implanted a mechanical heart made of silicone as a temporary measure. The experimental artificial heart was used for 65 hours, and was removed when a human heart became available.<br /><br /><b>Samuel Pierpont Langley</b><br /><br />Born 22 Aug 1834; died 27 Feb 1906.<br />American astronomer, physicist, and aeronautics pioneer who built the first heavier-than-air flying machine to achieve sustained flight. He launched his Aerodrome No.5 on 6 May 1896 using a spring-actuated catapult mounted on top of a houseboat on the Potomac River, near Quantico, Virginia. He also researched the relationship of solar phenomena to meteorology.<br /><br /><b>Denis Papin</b><br /><br />Born 22 Aug 1647; died c. 1712.<br />French-born British physicist who invented the pressure cooker (1679). He assisted Dutch physicist Christiaan Huygens with air-pump experiments, and went to London in 1675 to work with the English physicist Robert Boyle. A few years later, Papin invented his steam digester (pressure cooker), a closed vessel with a tightly fitting lid that confined the steam at a higher pressure, considerably raising the boiling point of the water. A safety valve of his own invention prevented explosions. Observing that the enclosed steam in his cooker tended to raise the lid, Papin conceived of the use of steam to drive a piston in a cylinder, the basic design for early steam engines. He never built an engine of his own, <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <em>"2012.. Year of the Dragon!! Get on the Dragon Wagon!".</em> </div>

 

[dragon04]

<font color="yellow"><b>Births</b></font><br /><br /><b>Sylvia Earle</b><br /><br />Born 30 Aug 1935<br />American oceanographer who is a devout advocate of public education regarding the importance of the oceans as an essential environmental habitat. In 1990, Earle was named the first woman to serve as chief scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the agency that conducts underwater research, manages fisheries, and monitors marine spills. She was among the first underwater explorers to make use of modern self-contained underwater breathing apparatus (SCUBA) gear, and identified many new species of marine life. With her former husband, Graham Hawkes, Earle designed and built a submersible craft that could dive to unprecedented depths of 3,000 feet. <br /><br /><b>Sir Ernest Rutherford</b><br /><br />Born 30 Aug 1871; died 19 Oct 1937.<br />(baron) New Zealand-born British physicist who laid the groundwork for the development of nuclear physics. He worked under Sir J. J. Thomson at Cambridge University (1895-98). Then he collaborated with Frederick Soddy in studying radioactivity. In 1899 he discovered alpha particles and beta particles, followed by the discovery of gamma radiation the following year. In 1905, with Soddy, he announced that radioactive decay involves a series of transformations. In 1907, with Hans Geiger and Ernest Marsden, he devised the alpha-particle scattering experiment that led in 1911 to the discovery of the atomic nucleus. In 1919 he achieved the artificial splitting of light atoms. In 1908 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry<br /><br /><b>John W. Mauchly</b><br /><br />Born 30 Aug 1907; died 8 Jan 1980.<br />American physicist and engineer, who with John P. Eckert invented (1946) the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC), the first general-purpose electronic computer. Mauchly initially conceived of the computer's architecture, and Eckert possessed the engineering skills to bring the idea to <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <em>"2012.. Year of the Dragon!! Get on the Dragon Wagon!".</em> </div>

 

[dragon04]

<font color="yellow"><b>Births</b></font><br /><br /><b>Robert Laurel Crippen</b><br /><br />Born 11 Sep 1937 - U.S. astronaut who piloted the first orbital test flight of the U.S. space shuttle program (STS-1, 12-14 Apr 1981). He was the commander of three additional shuttle flights. He first joined the U.S. Air Force Manned Orbiting Laboratory program in Oct 1966, and became a NASA astronaut in Sep 1969. Since then, Crippen has been part of the astronaut support crew for the Skylab 2, 3, and 4 missions, and for the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project mission. With NASA, he was Deputy Director (Jul 1987 - Dec 1989) then Director (Jan 1990-Jan 1992) of Shuttle Operations at the John F. Kennedy Space Center. He became the director of Kennedy Space Center (Jan 1992 - Jan 1995), during which time the center carried out 22 shuttle missions.<br /><br /><b>Gherman Stepanovich Titov</b><br /><br />Born 11 Sep 1935; died 20 Sep 2000. - Russian cosmonaut who was pilot of the Vostok 2 spacecraft on its 6-7 Aug 1961 orbital flight of 25 hrs 18 min. His spacecraft carried life-support equipment, radio and television for monitoring the condition of the cosmonaut, tape recorder, telemetry system, biological experiments, and automatic and manual control equipment. After Yuri Gagarin, Titov was the second human to orbit the Earth but was the first person to orbit more than once, the first to spend more than a day in space, and the first to sleep in space. He died holding the record as the youngest person in space (age 25). Titov was selected for cosmonaut training in 1960. After his spaceflight, Titov held senior positions in the Soviet space programme until his retirement in 1992<br /><br /><font color="yellow"><b>Deaths</b></font><br /><br /><b>Sylvester Graham</b><br /><br />Died 11 Sep 1851 (born 5 Jul 1794) - American physician and inventor of the graham cracker. Perhaps because of concern for his own health, after a long illness, he became interested in human physiology and nut <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <em>"2012.. Year of the Dragon!! Get on the Dragon Wagon!".</em> </div>

 

[alokmohan]

Birth sputnic,1957

 

[alokmohan]

The effect is called giant magnetoresistance, but it enables amazing things at the miniature level. Two European scientists won the 2007 Nobel Prize in physics Tuesday for their discoveries of the phenomenon, which spurred some of computing's most astonishing developments, from video-playing handheld devices to PCs whose storage capacity now seems all but limitless. <br />http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071009/ap_on_sc/nobel_physics<br />

 

[MeteorWayne]

sputnik <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><font color="#000080"><em><font color="#000000">But the Krell forgot one thing John. Monsters. Monsters from the Id.</font></em> </font></p><p><font color="#000080">I really, really, really, really miss the "first unread post" function</font><font color="#000080"> </font></p> </div>

 

[alokmohan]

A German scientist received a startling present Wednesday on his 71st birthday: a $1.5 million Nobel Prize to honor his groundbreaking studies of how chemical reactions take place on surfaces. <br /><br /><br /> <br />Gerhard Ertl laid the foundation for http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071010/ap_on_sc/nobel_chemistry<br />Sorry for misspellig sputnik.

 

[brellis]

October 18, 1967 Venera 4 goes under the clouds of Venus <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><font size="2" color="#ff0000"><em><strong>I'm a recovering optimist - things could be better.</strong></em></font> </p> </div>

 

[lukman]

30th October 1961 50MT Tsar Bomba is 2.1×10^17 joules, the average power produced during the entire fission-fusion process, lasting around 39 nanoseconds, was a power of about 5.3×10^24 watts or 5.3 yottawatts. This is equivalent to approximately 1% of the power output of the Sun. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[yevaud]

<p>December 13<br /><br />Births<br /><br />Philip Warren Anderson<br /><br />Philip Warren Anderson is an American physicist who (with John H. Van Vleck and Sir Nevill F. Mott) received the 1977 Nobel Prize for Physics for his research on semiconductors, superconductivity, and magnetism. He made contributions to the study of solid-state physics, and research on molecular interactions has been facilitated by his work on the spectroscopy of gases. He conceived a model (known as the Anderson model) to describe what happens when an impurity atom is present in a metal. He also investigated magnetism and superconductivity, and his work is of fundamental importance for modern solid-state electronics, making possible the development of inexpensive electronic switching and memory devices in computers.<br /><br />Johann von Lamont<br />. <br />Scottish-born German astronomer noted for discovering (1852) that the magnetic field of the Earth fluctuates with a 10.3-year activity cycle, but does not correlate it with the period of the sunspot cycle. From 1 Aug 1840, Johann von Lamont (as director of the Royal Astronomical Observatory in Munich) started regular and permanent observations of the earth's magnetic field. In the 1850's he started making regional magnetic surveys in the kingdom of Bavaria, later extended to other states in south Germany, France, Holland, Belgium, Spain, Portugal, Prussia and Denmark. His central European maps with isolines of geomagnetic elements, reduced to 1854, were the first worldwide.<br /><br />Kristian Birkeland<br /><br />Norwegian explorer and physicists, described as "The First Space Scientist", undertook pioneering work on the nature of the aurora using an terrella. He also also had astrophysical research published on cathode rays, the Zodiacal lights, comets, the Sun and sunspots, the origin of planets and their satellites, and the Earth's magnetism.</p> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p><em>Differential Diagnosis:  </em>"<strong><em>I am both amused and annoyed that you think I should be less stubborn than you are</em></strong>."<br /> </p> </div>