1802 in science

• March 28 – H. W. Olbers discovers the asteroid Pallas, the second known.
• May 6 – William Herschel coins the term asteroid{{cite journal |jstor=107120 |first=William |last=Herschel |title=Observations on the two lately discovered celestial Bodies |journal=Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London |volume=92 |pages=213–232 |date=6 May 1802 |doi=10.1098/rstl.1802.0010 }}{{cite web |url=http://aa.usno.navy.mil/faq/docs/minorplanets.php |first=James L. |last=Hilton |title=When Did the Asteroids Become Minor Planets? |date=2001-09-17 |access-date=2006-08-16 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090825024347/http://aa.usno.navy.mil/faq/docs/minorplanets.php |archive-date=2009-08-25 |url-status=dead }} and on July 1 first uses the term binary star to refer to a star which revolves around another.{{cite journal | date = 1802 | title = Catalogue of 500 New Nebulae, Nebulous Stars, Planetary Nebulae, and Clusters of Stars; With Remarks on the Construction of the Heavens| first= William |last=Herschel | jstor=107131| url =https://zenodo.org/record/1432308/files/article.pdf | journal = Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London | volume = 92 | pages = 477–528 [481] |bibcode = 1802RSPT...92..477H | doi = 10.1098/rstl.1802.0021 | doi-access = free }}

• Pierre André Latreille begins publication of his Histoire naturelle générale et particulière des crustacés et insectes.
• George Montagu publishes his Ornithological Dictionary; or Alphabetical Synopsis of British Birds.
• In the history of evolutionary thought
• Jean-Baptiste Lamarck publishes Recherches sur l'Organisation des Corps Vivants, proposing that all life is organized in a vertical chain of progressive complexity.{{cite book|last=Osborn|first=Henry Fairfield|author-link=Henry Fairfield Osborn|title=From the Greeks to Darwin: an outline of the development of the evolution idea|url=https://archive.org/details/fromgreekstodar00osbogoog|year=1905|publisher=Macmillan|location=New York|edition=2nd|page=[https://archive.org/details/fromgreekstodar00osbogoog/page/n175 160]}}
• Gottfried Reinhold Treviranus begins publication of Biologie; oder die Philosophie der lebenden Natur, proposing a theory of the transmutation of species.

• June – The first account of Thomas Wedgwood's experiments in photography using silver nitrate is published by Humphry Davy in the Journal of the Royal Institution in London."An Account of a method of copying Painting upon Glass and making profiles, by the agency of Light upon Nitrate of Silver." Invented by T. Wedgwood, Esq. with Observations by H. Davy.{{cite book|first=Robert|last=Hirsch|title=Seizing the Light: A Social & Aesthetic History of Photography|publisher=Taylor & Francis|year=2017}}{{cite book|last=Williams|first=Hywel|title=Cassell's Chronology of World History|url=https://archive.org/details/cassellschronolo0000will|url-access=registration|location=London|publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson|year=2005|isbn=0-304-35730-8|page=[https://archive.org/details/cassellschronolo0000will/page/354 354]}} Since a fixative for the image has not yet been devised, the early photographs quickly fade.
• July – William Hyde Wollaston notes the discovery of the noble metal palladium.
• Charles's law (the "law of volumes"), describing how gases tend to expand when heated, is first published in France by Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac.{{cite journal|last=Gay-Lussac|first=J. L.|title=Recherches sur la dilatation des gaz et des vapeurs|journal=Annales de chimie|volume=XLIII|page=137|url=http://web.lemoyne.edu/~giunta/gaygas.html| access-date=29 September 2010 }}

• Civil engineer and geographer François Antoine Rauch publishes Harmonie hydro-végétale et météorologique: ou recherches sur les moyens de recréer avec nos forêts la force des températures et la régularité des saisons par des plantations raisonnées in Paris, arguing against deforestation.

• James Smithson proves that zinc carbonates are true carbonate minerals and not zinc oxides, as was previously thought.{{cite web|title=Who was James Smithson? – A Man of Science|url=http://www.sil.si.edu/Exhibitions/Smithson-to-Smithsonian/who_04.html|publisher=Smithsonian Institution|access-date=2007-06-18| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070612070808/http://www.sil.si.edu/Exhibitions/Smithson-to-Smithsonian/who_04.html| archive-date=12 June 2007 }}{{cite journal|last=Smithson|first=James|title=A Chemical Analysis of Some Calamines|url=http://www.sil.si.edu/Exhibitions/Smithson-to-Smithsonian/calamine.html|journal=Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London|volume=Pt. I|year=1803| access-date= 25 February 2011 }}
• John Playfair publishes Illustrations of the Huttonian Theory of the Earth in Edinburgh, popularising James Hutton's theory of geology.
• James Sowerby begins to issue his British Mineralogy, or, coloured figures intended to elucidate the mineralogy of Great Britain in London, the first comprehensive illustrated reference work on the subject.

• June – The first pediatric hospital, the Hôpital des Enfants Malades, opens in Paris, on the site of a previous orphanage.{{cite book|last=Ballbriga|first=Angel|editor-last1=Nichols|editor-first1=Buford L.|editor-last2=Ballabriga|editor-first2=A.|editor-last3=Kretchmer|editor-first3=N.|title=History of Pediatrics 1850–1950|series=Nestlé Nutrition Workshop Series|volume=22|year=1991|publisher=Raven Press|location=New York|isbn=0-88167-695-0|pages=6–8|chapter=One century of pediatrics in Europe}}
• London Fever Hospital founded.
• Charles Bell publishes The Anatomy of the Brain, Explained in a Series of Engravings.{{cite web|first=L. S.|last=Jacyna|title=Bell, Sir Charles (1774–1842)|work=Oxford Dictionary of National Biography|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2004|url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/1999|access-date=2011-04-06|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/1999}} {{ODNBsub}}

• December – Luke Howard presents the basis of the modern classification and nomenclature of clouds, at a lecture in London.

• Johann Wilhelm Ritter builds the first electrochemical cell.{{cite journal|first=Hermann |last=Berg |year=2008 |title=Johann Wilhelm Ritter: the Founder of Scientific Electrochemistry |journal=Review of Polarography |volume=54 |number=2 |pages=99–103 |doi=10.5189/revpolarography.54.99 |doi-access=free }}{{cite book|first=Walter D.|last=Wetzels|year=1978|chapter=J. W. Ritter: the Beginnings of Electrochemistry in Germany|title=Selected Topics in the History of Electrochemistry|editor-last1=Dubpernell|editor-first1=G.|editor-last2=Westbrook|editor-first2=J. H.|location=Princeton|publisher=Electrochemical Society|pages=68–73}}

• April 10 – Great Trigonometric Survey of India begins with the measurement of a baseline near Madras.

• November 5 – Marc Isambard Brunel begins installation of his blockmaking machinery at Portsmouth Block Mills in England.{{cite book|last=Bagust|first=Harold|title=The Greater Genius? – a biography of Marc Isambard Brunel|year=2006|publisher=Ian Allan|location=Hersham|isbn=978-0-7110-3175-3|page=31}}
• George Bodley of Exeter in England patents the first enclosed kitchen stove.{{cite web|first1=David|last1=Cornforth|first2=Anne|last2=Speight|title=Bodley & Co.|url=http://www.exetermemories.co.uk/em/bodley.php|work=Exeter Memories|date=2009-05-03|access-date=2011-03-12}}{{cite web|title=The History of Ranges|url=http://www.antiquefireplacesandranges.com/historyofranges.html|publisher=Antique Fireplaces & Ranges|location=Tarvin|access-date=2011-03-12}}

• January 2 – Rev. Abraham Rees begins publication in London of The New Cyclopædia, or Universal Dictionary of Arts and Sciences.{{cite journal|url=http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/about_us/about_the_museum/science_library/~/media/EF4C87E781D6416E8CC65F252635C086.ashx|title=The subversive encyclopedia|first=John|last=Underwood|journal=Science Museum Library & Archives Newsletter|date=Spring–Summer 2010|publisher=Science Museum at Wroughton|access-date=2011-11-12|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110117233801/http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/about_us/about_the_museum/science_library/~/media/EF4C87E781D6416E8CC65F252635C086.ashx|archive-date=2011-01-17|url-status=dead}}

• Copley Medal: William Hyde Wollaston{{cite web |title=Copley Medal {{!}} British scientific award |url=https://www.britannica.com/science/Copley-Medal |website=Encyclopedia Britannica |access-date=21 July 2020 |language=en}}

• February 6 – Charles Wheatstone, English inventor (died 1875)
• April 4 – Dorothea Dix, American mental health reformer (died 1887)
• July 9 – Thomas Davenport, American inventor (died 1851)
• August 5 – Niels Henrik Abel, Norwegian mathematician (died 1829)
• October 10 – Hugh Miller, Scottish geologist (suicide 1856)
• December 15 – János Bolyai, Hungarian mathematician (died 1860)

• April 14 – John Mackay, Scottish botanist (born 1772)
• April 18 – Erasmus Darwin, English author of Zoonomia (born 1731)
• November 16 – André Michaux, French botanist (born 1746)

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Category:19th century in science

Category:1800s in science