1950 in science

• Dutch astronomer Jan Oort postulates the existence of an orbiting cloud of planets (the Oort cloud) at the outermost edge of the Solar System.{{cite journal|first=Jan|last=Oort|title=The structure of the cloud of comets surrounding the Solar System and a hypothesis concerning its origin|journal=Bulletin of the Astronomical Institutes of the Netherlands|volume=11|pages=91–110|year=1950|bibcode=1950BAN....11...91O}}
• Enrico Fermi discusses the Fermi paradox.{{cite web|url=http://www.fas.org/sgp/othergov/doe/lanl/la-10311-ms.pdf|title="Where is everybody?": An account of Fermi's question|first=Eric M.|last=Jones|series=Los Alamos technical report|date=March 1985}}

• Melvin Calvin, James Bassham, and Andrew Benson at the University of California, Berkeley, discover the Calvin cycle in photosynthesis.{{cite journal|author1=Bassham, J.|author2=Benson, A.|author3=Calvin, M.|title=The path of carbon in photosynthesis|url=http://www.jbc.org/cgi/reprint/185/2/781.pdf|journal=Journal of Biological Chemistry|volume=185|issue=2|pages=781–7|year=1950|pmid=14774424|doi=10.2172/910351|access-date=2011-06-10|archive-date=2009-02-19|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090219123745/http://www.jbc.org/cgi/reprint/185/2/781.pdf|url-status=dead}}
• Entomologist Willi Hennig publishes Grundzüge einer Theorie der phylogenetischen Systematik in East Germany, pioneering the study of cladistics.
• Full-scale release of myxomatosis for control of the Australian rabbit population.

• February 9 – Californium, a radioactive actinide transuranium element, is first synthesized by Stanley G. Thompson, Kenneth Street, Jr., Albert Ghiorso and Glenn T. Seaborg at the University of California, Berkeley.{{cite journal|author=Thompson, S. G.|author2=Street, Jr. K.|author3= Ghiorso, A.|author4= Seaborg, G. T.|title=Element 98|journal=Physical Review|year=1950|volume=78|issue=3|page=298|doi=10.1103/PhysRev.78.298.2|url=http://escholarship.org/uc/item/44g7z6hk|bibcode=1950PhRv...78..298T|doi-access=free}}{{cite journal|author=Thompson, S. G.|author2=Street, Jr. K.|author3=Ghiorso, A.|author4=Seaborg, G. T.|title=The New Element Californium (Atomic Number 98)|journal= Physical Review|year=1950|volume=80|issue=5|page=790|doi=10.1103/PhysRev.80.790|url=http://www.osti.gov/accomplishments/documents/fullText/ACC0050.pdf|bibcode=1950PhRv...80..790T}}{{cite journal|author1=Street, K. Jr.|author2=Thompson, S. G.|author3=Seaborg, G. T.|title=Chemical Properties of Californium|journal=Journal of the American Chemical Society|year=1950|volume=72|issue=10|page=4832|doi=10.1021/ja01166a528|url=http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA319899&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf|hdl=2027/mdp.39015086449173|access-date=2012-03-17|archive-date=2012-01-19|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120119092943/http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA319899&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf|url-status=dead}}

• March – Publication of Claude Shannon's paper "Programming a Computer for Playing Chess", seminal in the development of computer chess and introducing the Shannon number.{{cite journal|first=Claude E. |last=Shannon |title=Programming a Computer for Playing Chess |journal=Philosophical Magazine |volume=41 |issue=314 |pages=256–75 |url=http://archive.computerhistory.org/projects/chess/related_materials/text/2-0%20and%202-1.Programming_a_computer_for_playing_chess.shannon/2-0%20and%202-1.Programming_a_computer_for_playing_chess.shannon.062303002.pdf |accessdate=2012-01-20 |date=March 1950 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20100706211229/http://archive.computerhistory.org/projects/chess/related_materials/text/2-0%20and%202-1.Programming_a_computer_for_playing_chess.shannon/2-0%20and%202-1.Programming_a_computer_for_playing_chess.shannon.062303002.pdf |archivedate=2010-07-06 }}
• April – Publication of Richard Hamming's paper "Error detecting and error correcting codes", seminal in the construction of error detection and correction codes{{cite journal|first=R. W.|last=Hamming|title=Error detecting and error correcting codes|url=http://www.lee.eng.uerj.br/~gil/redesII/hamming.pdf|journal=Bell System Technical Journal|volume=29|issue=2|date=April 1950|pages=147–160|accessdate=2012-05-12|doi=10.1002/j.1538-7305.1950.tb00463.x|hdl=10945/46756|archive-date=2012-10-15|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121015031803/http://www.lee.eng.uerj.br/~gil/redesII/hamming.pdf|url-status=dead}}{{cite web|url=http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Hamming.html|title=Richard Wesley Hamming|first1=J. J.|last1=O'Connor|first2=E. F.|last2=Robertson|authorlink2=Edmund F. Robertson|work=MacTutor History of Mathematics archive|publisher=University of St Andrews |accessdate=2012-05-12 |date=January 2012}} and from which Hamming code and the Hamming distance derive.
• August 25 – In the early history of video games, Bertie the Brain is first displayed to the public at the Canadian National Exhibition.{{cite journal|url=http://spacing.ca/toronto/2014/08/13/meet-bertie-brain-worlds-first-arcade-game-built-toronto/|title=Meet Bertie the Brain, the world's first arcade game, built in Toronto|last=Bateman|first=Chris|date=2014-08-13|journal=Spacing|access-date=2014-11-16|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151222164300/http://spacing.ca/toronto/2014/08/13/meet-bertie-brain-worlds-first-arcade-game-built-toronto/|archive-date=2015-12-22|url-status=live}}
• October – Publication of Alan Turing's paper "Computing Machinery and Intelligence", seminal in the study of artificial intelligence and presenting the Turing test.{{cite journal|first=A. M.|last=Turing|title=Computing Machinery and Intelligence|url=http://loebner.net/Prizef/TuringArticle.html|journal=Mind|volume=59|issue=236|pages=433–60|doi=10.1093/mind/LIX.236.433|accessdate=2011-11-28|date=October 1950|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080702224846/http://loebner.net/Prizef/TuringArticle.html|archive-date=2008-07-02|url-status=dead|url-access=subscription}}{{cite book|editor1-last=Epstein|editor1-first=Robert|editor2-last=Roberts|editor2-first=Gary|editor3-last=Beber|editor3-first=Grace|title=Parsing the Turing Test: Philosophical and Methodological Issues in the Quest for the Thinking Computer|location=New York|publisher=Kluwer|year=2009|isbn=978-1-4020-6708-2}}

• John Forbes Nash, Jr. proposes the Nash equilibrium in game theory, initially in his Princeton doctoral thesis.{{citation|first=M. J.|last=Osborne|year=2004|title=An Introduction to Game Theory|publisher=Oxford University Press|page=23}}{{cite journal|title=Equilibrium Points in N-person Games|journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences|year=1950|pages=48–9|issue=1|pmid=16588946|last=Nash|first=J. F.|volume=36|pmc=1063129|doi=10.1073/pnas.36.1.48 |mr=0031701|bibcode = 1950PNAS...36...48N |doi-access=free}}.{{cite journal|last=Nash|first=J. F.|title=The Bargaining Problem|journal=Econometrica|year=1950|pages=155–62|volume=18 |issue=2|mr=0035977|doi=10.2307/1907266|jstor=1907266}}.
• The prisoner's dilemma is framed by Merrill Flood and Melvin Dresher at RAND and formalized and named by Albert W. Tucker.{{cite book|last=Poundstone|first=William|year=1992|title=Prisoner's Dilemma|publisher=Doubleday|location=New York|isbn=978-0385415675|url=https://archive.org/details/prisonersdilemma00poun}}

• June 17 – The first cadaveric internal kidney transplantation is performed on Ruth Tucker, a 44-year-old woman with polycystic kidney disease, at Little Company of Mary Hospital (Evergreen Park), Illinois. Although the donated kidney is rejected 10 months later because no effective immunosuppressive drugs have been developed at this time, the intervening time gives Tucker's remaining kidney time to recover and she lives another 5 years.{{cite book|title=Organ transplantation|first=David|last=Petechuk|publisher=Greenwood|year=2006|isbn=978-0-313-33542-6|page=[https://archive.org/details/organtransplanta0000pete/page/11 11]|url=https://archive.org/details/organtransplanta0000pete|url-access=registration|quote=kidney transplant ruth tucker.}}
• October – Australian-born British thoracic surgeon Norman Barrett describes the condition which will become known as Barrett's oesophagus.{{cite journal|last=Barrett|first=N. R.|title=Chronic Peptic Ulcer of the Œsophagus and 'Œsophagitis'|journal=British Journal of Surgery|volume=38|issue=150|pages=175–82|date=October 1950|pmid=14791960|doi=10.1002/bjs.18003815005|s2cid=72315839}}
• November – Eugene Roberts and Sam Frankel of Washington University School of Medicine report their discovery that GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid) is produced from glutamic acid and accumulates in the mammalian central nervous system, using newly-developed techniques of chromatography to analyze protein-free extracts of mammalian brain.{{Cite journal|last=Spiering|first=Martin J.|date=December 2018|title=The discovery of GABA in the brain|url=https://www.asbmb.org/asbmb-today/science/010119/jbc-the-discovery-of-gaba-in-the-brain|journal=Journal of Biological Chemistry|volume=293|issue=49|pages=19159–19160|doi=10.1074/jbc.cl118.006591|issn=0021-9258|pmc=6295731|pmid=30530855|doi-access=free}}{{Cite journal|last1=Roberts|first1=E.|last2=Frankel|first2=S.|date=November 1950|title=gamma-Aminobutyric acid in brain: its formation from glutamic acid|journal=Journal of Biological Chemistry|volume=187|issue=1|pages=55–63|doi=10.1016/S0021-9258(19)50929-2|doi-access=free|issn=0021-9258|pmid=14794689}}
• December 11 – The typical antipsychotic Chlorpromazine is first synthesized.
• Antihistamine discovered.
• The Duffy antigen is identified in a multiply-transfused hemophiliac patient.{{cite journal|title=A New Human Blood Group|journal=Nature|date=1950-02-04|last1=Cutbush|first1=M.|last2=Mollison|first2=P.L.|last3=Parkin|first3=D.M.|volume=165|issue=4188|pages=188–189|doi=10.1038/165188b0|bibcode=1950Natur.165..188C|s2cid=4265241}}
• An external artificial pacemaker is developed by John A. Hopps in conjunction with Wilfred Gordon Bigelow at Toronto General Hospital.

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• July – Oleg Lavrentiev outlines the concept of the tokamak.{{cite book|first=R. G.|last=Sharma|year=2015|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jbvdBgAAQBAJ&q=Tokamak+T-1+1958|title=Superconductivity: Basics and Applications to Magnets|page=311|publisher=Springer|isbn=9783319137131|accessdate=2019-06-27}}
• John Ward derives the Ward–Takahashi identity in quantum field theory.{{cite journal|first=J. C.|last=Ward|title=An identity in quantum electrodynamics|journal=Physical Review|volume=78|issue=2|page=182|year=1950|doi=10.1103/PhysRev.78.182|bibcode=1950PhRv...78..182W}}

• October 11 – A field-sequential color system developed by Hungarian American engineer Dr. Peter Goldmark becomes the first color television system to be adopted for commercial use (by CBS in the United States), but is abandoned a year later.{{cite news|title=C.B.S. Color Video Starts Nov. 20; Adapters Needed by Present Sets|newspaper=The New York Times|date=1950-10-12|page=1}}{{cite book|title=Radio and Television Regulation: Broadcast Technology in the United States 1920–1960|first=Hugh Richard|last=Slotten|publisher=JHU Press|year=2000|isbn=978-0-8018-6450-6|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cZLQ9R5GKfsC&q=%22Field+sequential+color+system%22&pg=PR11}}
• Canadians Harry Wasylyk, Larry Hansen and Frank Plomp introduce the plastic bin bag for garbage collection.{{cite web|publisher=CBC Television |url=http://www.cbc.ca/inventions/inventions.html?inventionID=21 |title=The Greatest Canadian Invention |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20101030012347/http://www.cbc.ca/inventions/inventions.html?inventionID=21 |archivedate=October 30, 2010 }}
• First practical pager, developed and manufactured by the Reevesound Company, is introduced for physicians in the New York City area.{{cite journal|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZyEDAAAAMBAJ&q=popular+science+1950+can+our+jets+support&pg=PA104|title=Pocket Radio Pages Doctors Night Or Day |journal=Popular Science |date=January 1951}}

• August 12 – In his encyclical Humani generis, Pope Pius XII declares evolution to be a serious hypothesis that does not contradict essential Roman Catholic teachings.
• J. Z. Young delivers the BBC [http://www.bbc.co.uk/reithlectures Reith Lectures] on [http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00h9lxm Doubt and Certainty in Science], introducing the radio audience to current developments in neurophysiology.

• Fields Prize in Mathematics (first postwar award): Laurent Schwartz and Atle Selberg
• Nobel Prizes
• Physics – Cecil Frank Powell
• Chemistry – Otto Paul Hermann Diels, Kurt Alder
• Medicine – Edward Calvin Kendall, Tadeus Reichstein, Philip Showalter Hench

• March 2 – James W. Pennebaker, American social psychologist.
• March 5 – Henry Marsh, English neurosurgeon.
• March 18 – Linda Partridge, English biogerontologist.
• May 16 – Georg Bednorz, German physicist, Nobel Prize in Physics 1987.
• June 8 – Stanley J. Korsmeyer (died 2005), American cell biologist.
• July 4 – Steven Sasson, American electrical engineer.
• October 21 – Ronald McNair (died on mission 1986), African American physicist and astronaut.
• November 1 – Robert B. Laughlin, American physicist, Nobel Prize in Physics 1998.
• November 3 – James Rothman, American cell biologist, Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2013.
• November 22 – Eva-Maria Neher, née Ruhr, German biochemist.
• December 13 – Julia Slingo, English meteorologist.
• December 27 – Joe Armstrong (died 2019), English computer scientist.
• December 28 – Frank Kelly, British mathematician.

• February 25 – George Minot (born 1885), American physician, Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1934.
• March – John Ryle (born 1889), English physician and epidemiologist.
• April 1 – Charles R. Drew (born 1904), African American physician, pioneer in blood transfusion.
• April 28 – Oakes Ames (born 1874), American botanist.
• September 10 – Annie Montague Alexander (born 1867), American paleontologist.
• September 21 – Arthur Milne (born 1896), English space physicist.
• December 11 – Leslie Comrie (born 1893), New Zealand astronomer and computing pioneer.

{{reflist}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:1950 In Science}}

Category:20th century in science

Category:1950s in science