The year 1789 in

science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...

and

technology Technology is the application of knowledge to reach practical goals in a specifiable and reproducible way. The word ''technology'' may also mean the product of such an endeavor. The use of technology is widely prevalent in medicine, science, ...

involved some significant events.

Anatomy

Antonio Scarpa Antonio Scarpa (9 May 1752 – 31 October 1832) was an Italian anatomist and professor. Biography Scarpa was born to an impoverished family in the frazione of Lorenzaga, Motta di Livenza, Veneto. An uncle, who was a member of the priesthood, gav ...

publishes ''Anatomicæ disquisitiones de auditu et olfactu'', a classic treatise on the hearing and olfactory organs.

Astronomy

* August 28 and September 17 –

William Herschel Frederick William Herschel (; german: Friedrich Wilhelm Herschel; 15 November 1738 – 25 August 1822) was a German-born British astronomer and composer. He frequently collaborated with his younger sister and fellow astronomer Caroline H ...

discovers

Saturn Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second-largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It is a gas giant with an average radius of about nine and a half times that of Earth. It has only one-eighth the average density of Earth; h ...

's moons

Enceladus Enceladus is the sixth-largest moon of Saturn (19th largest in the Solar System). It is about in diameter, about a tenth of that of Saturn's largest moon, Titan. Enceladus is mostly covered by fresh, clean ice, making it one of the most refl ...

and

Mimas Mimas may refer to: *Mimas (Giant), son of Gaia in Greek mythology, one of the Gigantes * Mimas (''Aeneid''), a son of Amycus and Theono, born the same night as Paris, who escorted Aeneas to Italy *Karaburun, a town and district in Turkey, formerl ...

, which he describes to the

Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

of London on November 12. *

Maximilian Hell Maximilian Hell ( hu, Hell Miksa) (born Rudolf Maximilian Höll; May 15, 1720 – April 14, 1792) was an astronomer and an ordained Jesuit priest from the Kingdom of Hungary. Biography Born as Rudolf Maximilian Höll in Selmecbánya, Hont Co ...

establishes the

constellation A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms Asterism (astronomy), a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The origins of the e ...

s '' Tubus Hershelli Major'' and ''Minor'' in honour of Herschel's discovery of Uranus (constellations obsolete by 1930).

Botany

Erasmus Darwin Erasmus Robert Darwin (12 December 173118 April 1802) was an English physician. One of the key thinkers of the Midlands Enlightenment, he was also a natural philosopher, physiologist, slave-trade abolitionist, inventor, and poet. His poems ...

publishes his poem '' The Loves of the Plants'', a popular rendering of

Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

' works. *

Antoine Laurent de Jussieu Antoine Laurent de Jussieu (; 12 April 1748 – 17 September 1836) was a French botanist, notable as the first to publish a natural classification of flowering plants; much of his system remains in use today. His classification was based on an e ...

publishes
Genera Plantarum: secundum ordines naturales disposita, juxta methodum in Horto regio parisiensi exaratam, anno M.DCC.LXXIV
', providing a basis for the system of natural classification of

flowering plant Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae (), commonly called angiosperms. The term "angiosperm" is derived from the Greek words ('container, vessel') and ('seed'), and refers to those plants th ...

s largely still in use.

Chemistry

Antoine Lavoisier Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier ( , ; ; 26 August 17438 May 1794), When reduced without charcoal, it gave off an air which supported respiration and combustion in an enhanced way. He concluded that this was just a pure form of common air and th ...

's '' Traité élémentaire de chimie'' presents a unified view of new theories of chemistry, containing a clear statement of the law of

conservation of mass In physics and chemistry, the law of conservation of mass or principle of mass conservation states that for any system closed to all transfers of matter and energy, the mass of the system must remain constant over time, as the system's mass can ...

, defining the nature of elements and denying the existence of

phlogiston The phlogiston theory is a superseded scientific theory that postulated the existence of a fire-like element called phlogiston () contained within combustible bodies and released during combustion. The name comes from the Ancient Greek (''burni ...

. He also helps establish the

scientific journal In academic publishing, a scientific journal is a periodical publication intended to further the progress of science, usually by reporting new research. Content Articles in scientific journals are mostly written by active scientists such as s ...

Annales de chimie __NOTOC__ ''Annales de chimie et de physique'' ( French for ''Annals of Chemistry and Physics'') is a scientific journal founded in Paris, France, in 1789 under the title ''Annales de chimie''. One of the early editors was the French chemist Ant ...

'' which will still be published into the 21st century. * German chemist

Martin Heinrich Klaproth Martin Heinrich Klaproth (1 December 1743 – 1 January 1817) was a German chemist. He trained and worked for much of his life as an apothecary, moving in later life to the university. His shop became the second-largest apothecary in Berlin, and ...

discovers the element

Uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

while studying the mineral

pitchblende Uraninite, formerly pitchblende, is a radioactive, uranium-rich mineral and ore with a chemical composition that is largely UO2 but because of oxidation typically contains variable proportions of U3O8. Radioactive decay of the uranium causes th ...

Exploration

* July 10 – Alexander Mackenzie reaches the Mackenzie River Delta.

Mathematics

* The Slovene mathematician

Jurij Vega Baron Jurij Bartolomej Vega (also Veha; la, Georgius Bartholomaei Vecha; german: Georg Freiherr von Vega; born ''Vehovec'', March 23, 1754 – September 26, 1802) was a Slovene mathematician, physicist and artillery officer. Early life Bor ...

presents his approximation of π to 140 decimal places of which the first 126 are correct, a feat not exceeded for more than half a century.

Medicine

* February 4 –

James Parkinson James Parkinson (11 April 175521 December 1824) was an English surgeon, apothecary, geologist, palaeontologist and political activist. He is best known for his 1817 work ''An Essay on the Shaking Palsy'', in which he was the first to describe ...

gives the first description of human injury from

lightning strike A lightning strike or lightning bolt is an electric discharge between the atmosphere and the ground. Most originate in a cumulonimbus cloud and terminate on the ground, called cloud-to-ground (CG) lightning. A less common type of strike, ground- ...

s, in a paper read to the

Medical Society of London The Medical Society of London is one of the oldest surviving medical societies (being organisations of voluntary association, rather than regulation or training) in the United Kingdom. It was founded in 1773 by the Quaker physician and philanthrop ...

. * Andrew Duncan delivers the first lectures on

forensic medicine Forensic medicine is a broad term used to describe a group of medical specialties which deal with the examination and diagnosis of individuals who have been injured by or who have died because of external or unnatural causes such as poisoning, assa ...

in Britain, at the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 15 ...

Technology

* Rev. Dr.

Edmund Cartwright Edmund Cartwright (24 April 174330 October 1823) was an English inventor. He graduated from Oxford University and went on to invent the power loom. Married to local Elizabeth McMac at 19, he was the brother of Major John Cartwright, a politic ...

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A p ...

s his first practical

power loom A power loom is a mechanized loom, and was one of the key developments in the industrialization of weaving during the early Industrial Revolution. The first power loom was designed in 1786 by Edmund Cartwright and first built that same year. ...

in England and designs a wool combing machine. *

William Wouldhave William Wouldhave (1751–1821) is a rival of Lionel Lukin for recognition as inventor of the lifeboat. His tombstone (erected thirteen years before Lukin’s) describes him as: ::::::‘''Inventor of that invaluable blessing to mankind the Lifeb ...

demonstrates a self-righting rescue lifeboat on the

River Tyne The River Tyne is a river in North East England. Its length (excluding tributaries) is . It is formed by the North Tyne and the South Tyne, which converge at Warden Rock near Hexham in Northumberland at a place dubbed 'The Meeting of the Wate ...

in England.

Zoology

* Swiss naturalist

François Huber François Huber (2 July 175022 December 1831), also known as Francis in English publications and Franz in German publications, was a Swiss entomologist who specialized in honey bees. His pioneering work was recognized all across Europe and ba ...

devises the "leaf

hive A hive may refer to a beehive, an enclosed structure in which some honey bee species live and raise their young. Hive or hives may also refer to: Arts * ''Hive'' (game), an abstract-strategy board game published in 2001 * "Hive" (song), a 201 ...

" for the cultivation of honey bees.

Awards

Copley Medal The Copley Medal is an award given by the Royal Society, for "outstanding achievements in research in any branch of science". It alternates between the physical sciences or mathematics and the biological sciences. Given every year, the medal is t ...

: William Morgan

Births

* February 26 –

Eaton Hodgkinson Eaton A. Hodgkinson FRS (26 February 1789 – 18 June 1861) was an English engineer, a pioneer of the application of mathematics to problems of structural design. Early life Hodgkinson was born in the village of Anderton, near Northwich, Ch ...

, English

structural engineer Structural engineers analyze, design, plan, and research structural components and structural systems to achieve design goals and ensure the safety and comfort of users or occupants. Their work takes account mainly of safety, technical, economic ...

(died

1861 Statistically, this year is considered the end of the whale oil industry and (in replacement) the beginning of the petroleum oil industry. Events January–March * January 1 ** Benito Juárez captures Mexico City. ** The first steam-p ...

) * March 16 –

Georg Ohm Georg Simon Ohm (, ; 16 March 1789 – 6 July 1854) was a German physicist and mathematician. As a school teacher, Ohm began his research with the new electrochemical cell, invented by Italian scientist Alessandro Volta. Using equipment of his o ...

, German

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...

(died

1854 Events January–March * January 4 – The McDonald Islands are discovered by Captain William McDonald aboard the ''Samarang''. * January 6 – The fictional detective Sherlock Holmes is perhaps born. * January 9 – The Teut ...

) * August 21 –

Augustin-Louis Cauchy Baron Augustin-Louis Cauchy (, ; ; 21 August 178923 May 1857) was a French mathematician, engineer, and physicist who made pioneering contributions to several branches of mathematics, including mathematical analysis and continuum mechanics. He ...

, French

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change. History On ...

(died

1857 Events January–March * January 1 – The biggest Estonian newspaper, ''Postimees'', is established by Johann Voldemar Jannsen. * January 7 – The partly French-owned London General Omnibus Company begins operating. * Janua ...

) * September 28 – Richard Bright, English

physician A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...

(died

1858 Events January–March * January – **Benito Juárez (1806–1872) becomes Liberal President of Mexico. At the same time, conservatives install Félix María Zuloaga (1813–1898) as president. **William I of Prussia becomes regent f ...

) * October 8 –

William John Swainson William John Swainson FLS, FRS (8 October 1789 – 6 December 1855), was an English ornithologist, malacologist, conchologist, entomologist and artist. Life Swainson was born in Dover Place, St Mary Newington, London, the eldest son of ...

, English naturalist (died

1855 Events January–March * January 1 – Ottawa, Ontario, is incorporated as a city. * January 5 – Ramón Castilla begins his third term as President of Peru. * January 23 ** The first bridge over the Mississippi River opens ...

) * October 25 –

Heinrich Schwabe Samuel Heinrich Schwabe (25 October 1789 – 11 April 1875) 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 ...

, German

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, g ...

(died

1875 Events January–March * January 1 – The Midland Railway of England abolishes the Second Class passenger category, leaving First Class and Third Class. Other British railway companies follow Midland's lead during the rest of the ...

)

Deaths

* April 7 –

Petrus Camper Petrus Camper FRS (11 May 1722 – 7 April 1789), was a Dutch physician, anatomist, physiologist, midwife, zoologist, anthropologist, palaeontologist and a naturalist in the Age of Enlightenment. He was one of the first to take an interest in ...

, Dutch

comparative anatomist Comparative anatomy is the study of similarities and differences in the anatomy of different species. It is closely related to evolutionary biology and phylogeny (the evolution of species). The science began in the classical era, continuing in t ...

(born

1722 Events January–March * January 27 – Daniel Defoe's novel ''Moll Flanders'' is published anonymously in London. * February 10 – The Battle of Cape Lopez begins off of the coast of West Africa (and present-day Gabon), as ...

) * May 25 –

Anders Dahl Anders (or Andreas) Dahl (17 March 1751 in Varnhem, Västergötland – 25 May 1789) was a Swedish botanist and student of Carl Linnaeus. The dahlia flower is named after him. Early life and education Andreas (Anders) Dahl was the son of Chri ...

, Swedish

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

for whom the

dahlia Dahlia (, ) is a genus of bushy, tuberous, herbaceous perennial plants native to Mexico and Central America. A member of the Asteraceae (former name: Compositae) family of dicotyledonous plants, its garden relatives thus include the sunflower, ...

is named (born

1751 In Britain and its colonies (except Scotland), 1751 only had 282 days due to the British Calendar Act of 1751, which ended the year on 31 December (rather than nearly three months later according to its previous rule). Events January&nd ...

) * ''undated'' –

Angélique du Coudray Angélique Marguerite Le Boursier du Coudray (c. 1712 – 17 April 1794) was an influential, pioneering midwife during her lifetime, who gained fame when men were taking over the field. She rose from middle-class origins to become noticed and comm ...

, French pioneer of modern

midwifery Midwifery is the health science and health profession that deals with pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period (including care of the newborn), in addition to the sexual and reproductive health of women throughout their lives. In many cou ...

(born

1712 In the Swedish calendar it began as a leap year starting on Monday and remained so until Thursday, February 29. By adding a second leap day (Friday, February 30) Sweden reverted to the Julian calendar and the rest of the year (from Saturday, M ...

)

References

{{reflist 18th century in science 1780s in science