1875 in science
Encyclopedia
The year 1875 in science
and technology
involved some significant events, listed below.
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
and technology
Technology
Technology is the making, usage, and knowledge of tools, machines, techniques, crafts, systems or methods of organization in order to solve a problem or perform a specific function. It can also refer to the collection of such tools, machinery, and procedures. The word technology comes ;...
involved some significant events, listed below.
Chemistry
- GalliumGalliumGallium is a chemical element that has the symbol Ga and atomic number 31. Elemental gallium does not occur in nature, but as the gallium salt in trace amounts in bauxite and zinc ores. A soft silvery metallic poor metal, elemental gallium is a brittle solid at low temperatures. As it liquefies...
is discovered spectroscopicallySpectroscopySpectroscopy is the study of the interaction between matter and radiated energy. Historically, spectroscopy originated through the study of visible light dispersed according to its wavelength, e.g., by a prism. Later the concept was expanded greatly to comprise any interaction with radiative...
by FrenchFranceThe French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
chemist Paul Emile Lecoq de BoisbaudranPaul Emile Lecoq de BoisbaudranPaul Émile Lecoq de Boisbaudran was a French chemist known for his discoveries of the chemical elements gallium, samarium and dysprosium.-Biography:...
. Later this year he obtains the free metal by electrolysisElectrolysisIn chemistry and manufacturing, electrolysis is a method of using a direct electric current to drive an otherwise non-spontaneous chemical reaction...
of its hydroxideHydroxideHydroxide is a diatomic anion with chemical formula OH−. It consists of an oxygen and a hydrogen atom held together by a covalent bond, and carrying a negative electric charge. It is an important but usually minor constituent of water. It functions as a base, as a ligand, a nucleophile, and a...
and names it. This is the first of Dmitri Mendeleev's predicted elements to be identified.
Medicine
- The weekly medical journalMedical journalA public health journal is a scientific journal devoted to the field of public health, including epidemiology, biostatistics, and health care . Public health journals, like most scientific journals, are peer-reviewed...
Deutsche Medizinische WochenschriftDeutsche Medizinische WochenschriftThe Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift is a German medical journal established in 1875 by Paul Börner...
is established in GermanyGermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
by Paul Börner.
Awards
- Copley MedalCopley MedalThe Copley Medal is an award given by the Royal Society of London for "outstanding achievements in research in any branch of science, and alternates between the physical sciences and the biological sciences"...
: August Wilhelm Hofmann - Wollaston medalWollaston MedalThe Wollaston Medal is a scientific award for geology, the highest award granted by the Geological Society of London.The medal is named after William Hyde Wollaston, and was first awarded in 1831...
for Geology: Laurent-Guillaume de KoninckLaurent-Guillaume de KoninckLaurent-Guillaume de Koninck was a Belgian palaeontologist and chemist, born at Leuven.He studied medicine in the university of his native town, and in 1831 he became assistant in the chemical schools. He pursued the study of chemistry in Paris, Berlin and Gießen, and was subsequently engaged in...
Births
- January 14 - Albert SchweitzerAlbert SchweitzerAlbert Schweitzer OM was a German theologian, organist, philosopher, physician, and medical missionary. He was born in Kaysersberg in the province of Alsace-Lorraine, at that time part of the German Empire...
(d. 19651965 in scienceThe year 1965 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Astronomy and space exploration:* February 20 - Ranger 8 crashes into the Moon after a successful mission of photographing possible landing sites for the Apollo program astronauts.* March 23 - NASA launches...
), medical missionary. - February 4 - Ludwig Prandtl (d. 19531953 in scienceThe year 1953 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Biochemistry:* April 25 - Francis Crick and James D...
), physicistPhysicistA physicist is a scientist who studies or practices physics. Physicists study a wide range of physical phenomena in many branches of physics spanning all length scales: from sub-atomic particles of which all ordinary matter is made to the behavior of the material Universe as a whole...
. - June 28 - Henri LebesgueHenri LebesgueHenri Léon Lebesgue was a French mathematician most famous for his theory of integration, which was a generalization of the seventeenth century concept of integration—summing the area between an axis and the curve of a function defined for that axis...
(d. 19411941 in scienceThe year 1941 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Biology:* George Wells Beadle and Edward Lawrie Tatum publish "Genetic Control of Biochemical Reactions in Neurospora" which shows that specific genes code for specific proteins.-Chemistry:* February 23 -...
), mathematicianMathematicianA mathematician is a person whose primary area of study is the field of mathematics. Mathematicians are concerned with quantity, structure, space, and change....
. - July 26 - Carl JungCarl JungCarl Gustav Jung was a Swiss psychiatrist and the founder of Analytical Psychology. Jung is considered the first modern psychiatrist to view the human psyche as "by nature religious" and make it the focus of exploration. Jung is one of the best known researchers in the field of dream analysis and...
(d. 19611961 in scienceThe year 1961 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Astronomy and space exploration:* January 31 - Ham, a 37-pound male chimpanzee, is rocketed into space in a test of the Project Mercury capsule designed to carry U.S. astronauts into space.* April 12 - Yuri...
), psychiatristPsychiatristA psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. All psychiatrists are trained in diagnostic evaluation and in psychotherapy...
. - October 23 - Gilbert N. LewisGilbert N. LewisGilbert Newton Lewis was an American physical chemist known for the discovery of the covalent bond , his purification of heavy water, his reformulation of chemical thermodynamics in a mathematically rigorous manner accessible to ordinary chemists, his theory of Lewis acids and...
(d. 19461946 in scienceThe year 1946 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Biology:* November 10 - Peter Scott opens the Slimbridge Wetland Reserve in England.* Karl von Frisch publishes "Die Tänze der Bienen" ....
), chemistChemistA chemist is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties such as density and acidity. Chemists carefully describe the properties they study in terms of quantities, with detail on the level of molecules and their component atoms...
; first to isolate deuteriumDeuteriumDeuterium, also called heavy hydrogen, is one of two stable isotopes of hydrogen. It has a natural abundance in Earth's oceans of about one atom in of hydrogen . Deuterium accounts for approximately 0.0156% of all naturally occurring hydrogen in Earth's oceans, while the most common isotope ...
.
Deaths
- February 22 - Charles LyellCharles LyellSir Charles Lyell, 1st Baronet, Kt FRS was a British lawyer and the foremost geologist of his day. He is best known as the author of Principles of Geology, which popularised James Hutton's concepts of uniformitarianism – the idea that the earth was shaped by slow-moving forces still in operation...
(b. 17971797 in scienceThe year 1797 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Births:* January 14 - Wilhelm Beer, Prussian astronomer * April 29 - George Don, Scottish botanist * November 14 - Charles Lyell, Scottish geologist...
), geologistGeologistA geologist is a scientist who studies the solid and liquid matter that constitutes the Earth as well as the processes and history that has shaped it. Geologists usually engage in studying geology. Geologists, studying more of an applied science than a theoretical one, must approach Geology using...
. - March 31 - Friedrich Julius RichelotFriedrich Julius RichelotFriedrich Julius Richelot was a German mathematician, born in Königsberg. He was a student of Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi....
(b. 18081808 in scienceThe year 1808 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Chemistry:* Barium, calcium, magnesium, and strontium isolated by Sir Humphry Davy.* Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac formulates the law of combining volumes for gases....
), mathematicianMathematicianA mathematician is a person whose primary area of study is the field of mathematics. Mathematicians are concerned with quantity, structure, space, and change....
. - April 11 - Heinrich SchwabeHeinrich SchwabeSamuel Heinrich Schwabe a German astronomer remembered for his work on sunspots.Schwabe was born at Dessau. At first an apothecary, he turned his attention to astronomy, and in 1826 commenced his observations on sunspots. Schwabe was trying to discover a new planet inside the orbit of Mercury...
(b. 17891789 in scienceThe year 1789 in science and technology involved some significant events.-Anatomy:* Antonio Scarpa publishes Anatomicæ disquisitiones de auditu et olfactu, a classic treatise on the hearing and olfactory organs.-Astronomy:...
), astronomerAstronomerAn astronomer is a scientist who studies celestial bodies such as planets, stars and galaxies.Historically, astronomy was more concerned with the classification and description of phenomena in the sky, while astrophysics attempted to explain these phenomena and the differences between them using...
. - October 19 - Charles WheatstoneCharles WheatstoneSir Charles Wheatstone FRS , was an English scientist and inventor of many scientific breakthroughs of the Victorian era, including the English concertina, the stereoscope , and the Playfair cipher...
(b. 18021802 in scienceThe year 1802 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Astronomy:* March 28 - H. W. Olbers discovers the second asteroid Pallas....
), inventor. - November 27 - Richard CarringtonRichard Christopher CarringtonRichard Christopher Carrington was an English amateur astronomer whose 1859 astronomical observations demonstrated the existence of solar flares as well as suggesting their electrical influence upon the Earth and its aurorae; and whose 1863 records of sunspot observations revealed the differential...
(b. 18261826 in scienceThe year 1826 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Chemistry:* Antoine Jerome Balard isolates bromine.* Michael Faraday determines the chemical formula of naphthalene.-Mathematics:...
), astronomer.