1807 in science

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The year 1807 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

Astronomy

• March 29 – H. W. Olbers discovers the asteroid which Carl Friedrich Gauss names Vesta.[1]

Chemistry

• Potassium and sodium are isolated by Sir Humphry Davy.
• The use of fulminate in firearms is patented by Scottish clergyman Alexander John Forsyth.[2]

Geology

• The Geological Society is founded in London; among the more prominent founders are William Babington, James Parkinson, Humphry Davy and George Bellas Greenough.

Mathematics

• William Wallace proves that any two simple polygons of equal area are equidecomposable, later known as the Wallace–Bolyai–Gerwien theorem.[3]

Medicine

• Samuel Hahnemann first introduces the term 'homeopathy' in an essay, "Indications of the Homeopathic Employment of Medicines in Ordinary Practice", published in Versammlung der Hufelandische medicinisch-chirurgischen Gesellschaft.[4]
• British Army surgeon John Vetch describes the keratoconjunctivitis ("Egyptian ophthalmia") suffered by troops returned from service overseas;[5] he identifies it as epidemic.[6]

Technology

• July 20 – French brothers Claude and Nicéphore Niépce receive a patent for their Pyréolophore, an early internal combustion engine, having demonstrated it powering a boat on the Saône.
• August 17 – Robert Fulton's North River Steamboat makes her first trip from New York City to Albany.
• November 19 – English inventor Lionel Lukin launches the world's first sailing self-righting rescue life-boat, the Frances Anne, at Lowestoft.[7]
• William Cubitt patents self-regulating sails for windmills.[8]
• Henry Maudslay patents an improved table engine.
• William Hyde Wollaston patents the camera lucida.[9]

Zoology

• April 21 – The Tasmanian devil is first described, by George Prideaux Robert Harris.[10]

Publications

• Alexander von Humboldt's Le Voyage aux Régions equinoxiales du Nouveau Continent, fait en 1799–1804, par Alexandre de Humboldt et Aimé Bonpland begins publication.
• Thomas Young's A Course of Lectures on Natural Philosophy and the Mechanical Arts published.

Awards

• Copley Medal: Everard Home[11]

Births

• January 28 – Robert McClure, Irish-born Arctic explorer (died 1873)
• May 28 – Louis Agassiz, Swiss-born American zoologist and geologist (died 1873)
• November 14 – Auguste Laurent, French chemist (died 1853)
• November 30 – William Farr, English epidemiologist (died 1883)

Deaths

• February 27 – Louise du Pierry, French astronomer (born 1746)
• April 4 – Jérôme Lalande, French astronomer (born 1732)
• December 5 – Francis Willis, English physician specialising in mental disorders (born 1718)

References

1. "4 Vesta". JPL Small-Body Database Browser. Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Retrieved 2011-08-09.
2. "Rifled Breech Loader". globalsecurity.org. Retrieved 22 September 2011.
3. Stewart, Ian (1996). From Here to Infinity (3rd ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 169. ISBN 978-0-19-283202-3.
4. Gumpert, Martin (1945). Hahnemann: the Adventurous Career of a Medical Rebel (English-language ed.). New York: Fischer. p. 130.
5. Vetch, John (1807). An Account of the Ophthalmia. London: Longman.
6. Feibel, Robert M. (1983). "John Vetch and the Egyptian Ophthalmia". Survey of Ophthalmology. History of Ophthalmology. 28: 128–34.
7. Malster, Robert, ed. (2013). The Minute Books of the Suffolk Humane Society... and the world's first sailing lifeboat. Suffolk Records Society, vol. 56. Woodbridge: Boydell Press. ISBN 978-1-84383-805-0.
8. Brown, Peter. "Sir William Cubitt (1785-1861)". Archived from the original on 16 July 2011. Retrieved 2011-07-18.
9. Hammond, John; Austin, Jill (1987). The camera lucida in art and science. Taylor & Francis.
10. Harris, G. P. (1807). "Description of two new Species of Didelphis from Van Diemen's Land". Transactions of the Linnean Society of London. 9: 174–78. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.1818.tb00336.x. Retrieved 2015-12-10.
11. "Copley Medal | British scientific award". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 21 July 2020.