1850 in science

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The year 1850 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

Contents 1 Chemistry 2 Mathematics 3 Meteorology 4 Physics 5 Technology 6 Awards 7 Births 8 Deaths 9 References

Chemistry

• October 17 - James Young patents a method of distilling paraffin from coal.

Mathematics

• Thomas Kirkman proposes Kirkman's schoolgirl problem.^[1][2]
• J. J. Sylvester originates the term matrix in mathematics.^[3][4]

Meteorology

• April 3 - British Meteorological Society founded.

Physics

• Rudolf Clausius publishes his paper on the mechanical theory of heat, which first states the basic ideas of the second law of thermodynamics.^[5]
• Hippolyte Fizeau and E. Gounelle measure the speed of electricity.
• Léon Foucault demonstrates the greater speed of light in air than in water, and establishes that the speed of light in different media is inverse to the refractive indices of the media, using the Fizeau-Foucault apparatus.
• May – John Tyndall and Hermann Knoblauch publish a report on "The magneto-optic properties of crystals, and the relation of magnetism and diamagnetism to molecular arrangement".

Technology

• July 14 - John Gorrie makes the first public demonstration of his ice-making machine, in Apalachicola, Florida.^[6]

Awards

• Copley Medal: Peter Andreas Hansen
• Wollaston Medal: William Hopkins

Births

• January 15 - Sofia Kovalevskaya (d. 1891), mathematician.
• January 24 - Hermann Ebbinghaus (d. 1909), psychologist.
• February 15 - Sophie Bryant (d. 1922), mathematician and educationalist.
• March 31 - Charles Walcott (d. 1927), paleontologist.
• May 18 - Oliver Heaviside (d. 1925), physicist.
• May 23 - George Claridge Druce (d. 1932), botanist.
• June 6 - Karl Ferdinand Braun (d. 1918), physicist.
• August 25 - Charles Richet (d. 1935), Nobel Prize winner.

Deaths

• March 27 - Wilhelm Beer (b. 1797), astronomer.
• April 9 - William Prout (b. 1785), chemist.
• May 10 - Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac (b. 1778), chemist and physicist.

References