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1884 in science

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The year 1884 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

Chemistry

  • October 14 – George Eastman is granted his first patents for photographic roll film in the United States.
  • J. H. van 't Hoff proposes the Arrhenius equation for the temperature dependence of the reaction rate constant, and therefore, rate of a chemical reaction.[https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/A00446 Arrhenius equation] – IUPAC Goldbook definition
  • Hermann Emil Fischer proposes the structure of purine, a key component in many biomolecules, which he synthesizes in 1898; he also begins work on the chemistry of glucose and related sugars.{{cite web|title= Emil Fischer: The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1902|work=Nobel Lectures, Chemistry 1901–1921|publisher=Elsevier Publishing Company|year=1966|url= http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/1902/fischer-bio.html|accessdate= 2007-02-28}}
  • Henry Louis Le Chatelier develops Le Chatelier's principle, which explains the response of dynamic chemical equilibria to external stresses.{{cite book|title=Henry Louis Le Châtelier|series=World of Scientific Discovery|publisher=Thomson Gale|year=2005|url=http://www.bookrags.com/biography/henry-louis-le-chatelier-wsd/|accessdate=2007-03-24}}
  • Paul Vieille invents Poudre B, the first smokeless powder for firearms.{{cite book|last=Davis|first=Tenney L.|title=The Chemistry of Powder and Explosives|year=1943|pages=289–292|location=New York|publisher=Wiley}}

Climatology

  • The Köppen climate classification scheme is first published by German-Russian botanist Wladimir Köppen.{{Cite journal |last=Köppen |first=Wladimir |date=1884 |title=Die Wärmezonen der Erde, nach der Dauer der heissen, gemässigten und kalten Zeit und nach der Wirkung der Wärme auf die organische Welt betrachtet |trans-title=The thermal zones of the earth according to the duration of hot, moderate and cold periods and to the impact of heat on the organic world) |url=https://boris.unibe.ch/9257/1/s9.pdf |url-status= |journal=Meteorologische Zeitschrift |publication-date=2011 |volume=20 |issue=3 |pages=351–360 |bibcode=2011MetZe..20..351K |doi=10.1127/0941-2948/2011/105 |s2cid=209855204 |archive-url= |archive-date= |access-date=2 September 2016 |translator1-first=E. |translator1-last=Volken |translator2-first=S |translator2-last=Brönnimann}}

Mathematics

Medicine

  • January 7 – German microbiologist Robert Koch isolates Vibrio cholerae, the cholera bacillus, working in India.Koch, R. (20 March 1884) {{lang|de|2=[https://books.google.com/books?id=yY41AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA191 "Sechster Bericht der deutschen wissenschaftlichen Commission zur Erforschung der Cholera"]}} (Sixth report of the German scientific commission for research on cholera), {{lang|de|Deutsche medizinische Wochenscrift}} (German Medical Weekly), 10 (12): 191–192. On page 191, he mentions the characteristic comma shape of Vibrio cholerae: "{{lang|de|Im letzten Berichte konnte ich bereits gehorsamst mittheilen, dass an den Bacillen des Choleradarms besondere Eigenschaften aufgefunden wurden, durch welche sie mit aller Sicherheit von anderen Bakterien zu unterscheiden sind. Von diesen Merkmalen sind folgende die am meisten charakteristischen: Die Bacillen sind nicht ganz geradlinig, wie die übrigen Bacillen, sondern ein wenig gekrümmt, einem Komma ähnlich.}}" (In the last report, I could already respectfully report that unusual characteristics were discovered in the bacteria of enteric cholera, by which they are to be distinguished with complete certainty from other bacteria. Of these features, the following are the most characteristic: the bacteria are not quite straight, like the rest of the bacilli, but a little bent, similar to a comma.) Koch and Friedrich Loeffler formulate Koch's postulates on the causal relationship between microbes and diseases. Loeffler also discovers the causative organism for diphtheria, Corynebacterium diphtheriae.
  • Dr Takaki Kanehiro of the Imperial Japanese Navy conducts a controlled experiment demonstrating that deficient diet is the cause of beriberi, but mistakenly concludes that sufficient protein alone would prevent it.{{cite journal|last=Rosenfeld|first=L.|title=Vitamine—vitamin: the early years of discovery|journal=Clin Chem|volume=43|pages=680–5|year=1997|issue=4|pmid=9105273|doi=10.1093/clinchem/43.4.680|doi-access=free}}
  • Georg Theodor Gaffky isolates the pathogenic bacillus salmonella typhi as the cause of typhoid fever.{{cite journal|last=Gaffky|first=G. T. A.|year=1884|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Y6lQAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA372|title=Zur Aetiology des Abdominaltyphus|journal=Mittheilungen aus dem Kaiserlichen Gesundheitsamte|volume=2|pages=372–420}}{{cite journal|author=Hardy, A.|title=Food, hygiene, and the laboratory. A short history of food poisoning in Britain, circa 1850-1950|journal=Social History of Medicine|volume=12|issue=2|pages=293–311|date=August 1999|pmid=11623930|doi=10.1093/shm/12.2.293}}
  • Ophthalmologist Karl Koller announces his use of a local anesthetic (cocaine) in surgery;At a medical congress in Heidelberg, Germany, September 15. {{cite journal|last1=Honegger|first1=H.|last2=Hessler|first2=H.|title=[Discovery of local anesthesia by Karl Koller. I]|journal=Klinische Monatsblätter für Augenheilkunde|volume=157|issue=3|pages=428–38|location=West Germany|issn=0023-2165|pmid=4922411|language=German|date=September 1970}} Jellinek also demonstrates cocaine's effects as an anesthetic on the respiratory system.
  • Friedrich Schultze first describes the disorder that will become known as Charcot–Marie–Tooth disease.{{cite web|last=Enersen|first=Ole Daniel|url=http://www.whonamedit.com/synd.cfm/30.html|title=Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease|work=Whonamedit?|accessdate=April 12, 2011|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110628223408/http://www.whonamedit.com/synd.cfm/30.html|archivedate= June 28, 2011|url-status=dead}}
  • First known case of artificial insemination by sperm donation: William H. Pancoast, a professor in Philadelphia, takes sperm from his "best looking" student to inseminate an anesthetized woman without her knowledge, not reported for 25 years.{{Cite web|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/01/first-artificial-insemination/423198/|title=The First Artificial Insemination Was an Ethical Nightmare|last=Yuko|first=Elizabeth|date=2016-01-08|website=The Atlantic|language=en-US|access-date=2019-07-17}}{{Cite web |last=Kramer |first=Wendy |date=2016-05-10 |title=A Brief History of Donor Conception |url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/a-brief-history-of-donor-conception_b_9814184 |access-date=2021-07-29 |website=HuffPost |language=en}}{{cite journal|journal=The Medical World |date=April 1909 |pages=163–164 |title=Letter to the Editor: Artificial Impregnation |url=http://familyscholars.org/2011/02/17/4579/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120724221400/http://familyscholars.org/2011/02/17/4579/ |archive-date=2012-07-24 }} (cited in {{cite journal|author1=Gregoire, A. |author2=Mayer, R.|year=1964|title=The impregnators|journal=Fertility and Sterility|volume=16|pages=130–4 | pmid = 14256095|doi=10.1016/s0015-0282(16)35476-0|doi-access=free}})
  • Among the papers on brain function published by Vladimir Bekhterev is a study on the formation of the human conception of space.{{cite journal|first=Alexander|last=Petrunkevitch|title=Russia's Contribution to Science|journal=Transactions of the Connecticut Academy of Sciences|volume=23|year=1920|page=232}}

Physics

Technology

  • February 12 – Lewis Waterman gets his first patent for a capillary feed fountain pen in the United States.{{US patent|293545}}.
  • May 16 – Angelo Moriondo of Turin is granted a patent for an espresso machine.#33/256. Bollettino delle privative industriali del Regno d’Italia 2nd Series 15 (1884) pp. 635–655.
  • June 13 – LaMarcus Adna Thompson opens the "Gravity Pleasure Switchback Railway" at Coney Island, New York City.
  • October – Hiram Maxim first demonstrates the Maxim gun, the first self-powered machine gun (using recoil operation).{{cite book|last=McCallum|first=Iain|title=Blood Brothers – Hiram and Hudson Maxim: Pioneers of Modern Warfare|publisher=Chatham Publishing|location=London|year=1999|isbn=978-1-86176-096-8|page=49}}
  • Fall – Chester H. Pond invents the first electrical self-winding clock.{{cite book|last=Kane|first=Joseph Nathan|year=1997|title=Famous First Facts: A Record of First Happenings, Discoveries and Inventions in the United States|edition=5th|publisher=H. W. Wilson|page=[https://archive.org/details/famousfirstfacts00kane_0/page/605 605]|isbn=0824209303|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/famousfirstfacts00kane_0/page/605}}
  • Charles Parsons invents the modern steam turbine.{{cite web|url=http://www.universityscience.ie/pages/scientists/sci_charles_parsons.php|title=Charles Parsons (1854–1931)|access-date=2024-11-03|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080110063209/http://www.universityscience.ie/pages/scientists/sci_charles_parsons.php|archive-date=2008-01-10|work=Profiles of Scientists from Irish Universities|via=Wayback Machine}}
  • Charles Renard and Arthur Constantin Krebs make a fully controllable free-flight in French Army airship La France with an electric motor.{{cite book|last1=Winter|first1=Lumen|last2=Degner|first2=Glenn|title=Minute Epics of Flight|location=New York|publisher=Grosset & Dunlap|year=1933|pages=49–50}}
  • Hungarian engineers Károly Zipernowsky, Ottó Bláthy and Miksa Déri invent the closed core high efficiency transformer and AC parallel power distribution.{{Cite journal|last=Guarnieri|first=M.|year=2013|title=Who Invented the Transformer?|journal=IEEE Industrial Electronics Magazine|volume=7|issue=4|pages=56–59|doi= 10.1109/MIE.2013.2283834}}
  • Thomas Parker builds a practical production electric car in Wolverhampton (England) using his own specially designed high-capacity rechargeable batteries.
  • Mexican General Manuel Mondragón designs an early form of the Mondragón rifle, the world's first automatic rifle.

Other events

  • September 24 – Smeaton's Tower opened to the public on Plymouth Hoe as a monument to the history of civil engineering.{{cite web|website=The Encyclopaedia of Plymouth History|publisher=Plymouth Data|last=Moseley|first=Brian|title=Smeaton's Tower|date=August 2007|url=http://www.plymouthdata.info/Memorial-Smeaton%27s%20Tower.htm|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110316120322/http://www.plymouthdata.info/Memorial-Smeaton%27s%20Tower.htm|archivedate=2011-03-16|accessdate=2015-02-13}}
  • October 22 – International Meridian Conference in Washington, D.C. fixes the Greenwich meridian as the world's prime meridian.
  • Sophie Bryant becomes the first woman in England to be awarded the degree of Doctor of Science, by the University of London. Also in this year, she is the first woman to publish a paper with the London Mathematical Society.
  • Sofia Kovalevskaya is appointed "Professor Extraordinarius" in mathematics at Stockholm University and becomes the editor of Acta Mathematica.{{cite book|first=Roger|last=Cooke|title=The Mathematics of Sonya Kovalevskaya|url=https://archive.org/details/mathematicsofson0000cook|url-access=registration|location=New York|publisher=Springer-Verlag|year=1984|isbn=978-0-387-96030-2}}

Awards

Births

Deaths

References

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Category:19th century in science

Category:1880s in science