1978 in science

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The year 1978 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

Astronomy and space science

• March 2 – Vladimír Remek becomes the first Czechoslovak in space and the first cosmonaut from a country other than the Soviet Union or the United States, onboard Soyuz 28.
• June 22 – James W. Christy at the United States Naval Observatory discovers Charon, the first moon of Pluto identified.
• October – It is first proposed that Janus and Epimetheus are two separate moons of Saturn sharing the same orbit.[1]

Computer science

• February 16 – The first computer bulletin board system is created (CBBS in Chicago, Illinois).
• The RSA algorithm for public-key cryptography, based on the factoring problem, is first publicly described by Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir and Leonard Adleman.[2]

Geophysics

• James Byerlee determines Byerlee's law which gives the stress circumstances in the Earth's crust at which fracturing along a geological fault takes place.[3]

History of science

• October 17 – James Burke's history of science series Connections first airs, on BBC Television in the United Kingdom (with accompanying book).[4]

Paleontology

• Fossils of Saint Bathans mammal first collected.
• Fossil footprints of bipedal hominini from 3.6M BP found at Laetoli in Tanzania in 1976 are excavated by Mary Leakey's team.
• A fossilized partial human cranium is among hominid remains found in Apidima Cave in southern Greece; in 2019 it is announced as dating to more than 210,000 years BP, making it the earliest example of Homo sapiens outside Africa.[5]

Physiology and medicine

• May 13 – "Basaglia Law" (Mental Health Act) in Italy requires closing down of all psychiatric hospitals and their replacement with community services.
• July 25 – Louise Brown becomes the world's first human born from in vitro fertilisation, in England.[6]
• August – Osteocalcin first identified in animal bone.[7]
• September 6 – Production of the first genetically engineered synthetic "human" insulin using E. coli by Arthur Riggs and Keiichi Itakura at the Beckman Research Institute of the City of Hope National Medical Center in collaboration with Herbert Boyer at Genentech is announced in California.[8][9]
• The rare genetic disorder Pitt–Hopkins syndrome is first described.[10]
• Victor Skumin first describes "cardioprosthetic psychopathological syndrome",[11] later known as "Skumin syndrome",[12] a form of anxiety suffered by recipients of artificial heart valves.
• Imposter syndrome is first described as a phenomenon.[13]

Awards

• Fields Prize in Mathematics: Pierre Deligne, Charles Fefferman, Grigory Margulis, Daniel Quillen
• Nobel Prizes
  • Physics – Pyotr Leonidovich Kapitsa, Arno Allan Penzias, Robert Woodrow Wilson
  • Chemistry – Peter D. Mitchell
  • Medicine – Werner Arber, Daniel Nathans, Hamilton O. Smith
• Turing Award – Robert Floyd

Births

• March 16 – Jemma Redmond (d. 2016), Irish biochemist, pioneer of 3D bioprinting
• July – Caucher Birkar, born Fereydoun Derakhshani, Kurdish-born mathematician
• November 1 – Helen Czerski, English physicist and science populariser

Deaths

• January 14 – Kurt Gödel (b. 1906), American mathematician
• February 25 – Edith Humphrey (b. 1875), English chemist
• March 9 – Gaston Julia (b. 1893), French mathematician
• March 23 – Haim Ernst Wertheimer (b. 1893), Jewish biochemist
• March 30 – Bill Hamilton (b. 1899), New Zealand mechanical engineer
• March 31 – Charles Best (b. 1899), Canadian medical scientist
• April 21 – Thomas Wyatt Turner (b. 1877), American civil rights activist, biologist and educator; first black person ever to receive a doctorate from Cornell University
• July 22 – André Chapelon (b. 1892), French steam locomotive designer
• September 15 – Willy Messerschmitt (b. 1898), German aircraft engineer
• November 15 – Margaret Mead (b. 1901), American cultural anthropologist

References

1. Fountain, J. W.; Larson, S. M. (1978). "Saturn's ring and nearby faint satellites". Icarus. 36 (1): 92–106. Bibcode:1978Icar...36...92F. doi:10.1016/0019-1035(78)90076-3.
2. Rivest, R.; Shamir, A.; Adleman, L. (1978). "A Method for Obtaining Digital Signatures and Public-Key Cryptosystems" (PDF). Communications of the ACM. 21 (2): 120–126. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.607.2677. doi:10.1145/359340.359342. S2CID 2873616. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2007-01-27. Retrieved 2012-01-28.
3. Byerlee, J. D. (1978). "Friction of rocks". Pure and Applied Geophysics. 116 (4–5): 615–626. Bibcode:1978PApGe.116..615B. doi:10.1007/BF00876528. S2CID 128666327.
4. ISBN 0-333-24827-9.
5. Harvati, Katerina; Röding, Carolin; Bosman, Abel M.; Karakostis, Fotios A.; Grün, Rainer; Stringer, Chris; Karkanas, Panagiotis; Thompson, Nicholas C.; Koutoulidis, Vassilis; Moulopoulos, Lia A.; Gorgoulis, Vassilis G.; Kouloukoussa, Mirsini (2019). "Apidima Cave fossils provide earliest evidence of Homo sapiens in Eurasia". Nature. 571 (7766): 500–504. doi:10.1038/s41586-019-1376-z. PMID 31292546. S2CID 195873640.
6. "1978: First 'test tube baby' born". On This Day. BBC News. 1978-07-25. Archived from the original on 2007-12-21. Retrieved 2013-12-18.
7. Hauschka, P. V.; Reid. M. L. (1978). "Timed appearance of a calcium-binding protein containing gamma-carboxyglutamic acid in developing chick bone". Developmental Biology. 65 (2): 426–34. doi:10.1016/0012-1606(78)90038-6. PMID 680371.
8. "First Successful Laboratory Production of Human Insulin Announced". News Release. Genentech. 1978-09-06. Retrieved 2014-01-06.
9. Tof, Ilanit (1994). "Recombinant DNA Technology in the Synthesis of Human Insulin". Little Tree. Retrieved 2014-01-06.
10. Pitt, D.; Hopkins, I. (1978). "A syndrome of mental retardation, wide mouth and intermittent overbreathing". Australian Paediatric Journal. 14 (3): 182–184. doi:10.1111/jpc.1978.14.3.182. PMID 728011. S2CID 45629810.
11. Bendet, Ia. A.; Morozov, S. M.; Skumin, V. A. (1980). "Psychological aspects of the rehabilitation of patients after the surgical treatment of heart defects" Психологические аспекты реабилитации больных после хирургического лечения пороков сердца [Psychological aspects of the rehabilitation of patients after the surgical treatment of heart defects]. Kardiologiia (in Russian). 20 (6): 45–51. PMID 7392405. Retrieved 25 June 2024.
12. "Skumin syndrome". wikidata.org. Archived from the original on 2012-04-26. Retrieved 30 January 2023.
13. Clance, Pauline R.; Imes, Suzanne A. (1978). "The Impostor Phenomenon in High Achieving Women: Dynamics and Therapeutic Intervention" (PDF). Psychotherapy: Theory, Research & Practice. 15 (3): 241–247. doi:10.1037/h0086006.