Today in Science Blog Posts
2019: The International Year of the Periodic Table of Elements
To celebrate an essential organizational tool in the scientific community, the United Nations named 2019 the International Year of The Periodic Table of Chemical Elements.
Happy Birthday, Émilie du Châtelet
Émilie du Châtelet is known for translating Newtonian concepts, discovering a conservation law for total energy, and publishing an expansive work called Foundations of Physics.
Happy Birthday, Ellen Swallow Richards
Ellen Swallow Richards, an American chemical engineer, improved sanitary engineering and was the first woman to attend, graduate from, and teach at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Happy Birthday, Sir Horace Lamb
Sir Horace Lamb, a prolific applied mathematician and leader in hydrodynamics research, was one of the first four professors at the University of Adelaide in Australia and was knighted in 1931.
Advancing Technology Helps Keep Ocean Gyres Free of Debris
The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is twice the size of the state of Texas, but advancing technology that relies on the Coriolis effect is kickstarting cleanup efforts.
Happy Birthday, Edwin Hubble
Edwin Hubble is an observational cosmologist who proved that the universe expands at a constant rate. His namesake Hubble Space Telescope was launched by NASA in 1990 to continue his research.
Happy Birthday, Lord Rayleigh
Did you know that Lord Rayleigh was the first person to explain why the sky is blue? He also discovered argon and won the Nobel Prize in Physics.
Happy Birthday, William D. Coolidge
William D. Coolidge was granted a total of 83 patents throughout his life, 2 of which you might find particularly interesting: tungsten filament and the Coolidge tube.
Happy Birthday, Robert Hutchings Goddard
Robert Hutchings Goddard is considered the “Father of Modern Rocketry”. Read about how he went from reading science fiction to making strides in scientific innovation.
Happy Birthday, Nora Stanton Blatch Barney
In the early 1900s, Nora Stanton Blatch Barney, a civil engineer, assisted in constructing bridges with the American Bridge Company and building subway tunnels in New York City.
Happy Birthday, Hermann von Helmholtz
Hermann von Helmholtz made major contributions to the fields of physiology, optics, electromagnetism, and more. He also notably challenged common perceptions in science using philosophy.
Happy Birthday, Sir George Gabriel Stokes
Read about the life, work, and research of the physicist behind the famous fluid dynamics equation: Sir George Gabriel Stokes.
Happy Birthday, Paul Dirac
Paul Dirac, a British physicist, sought to theorize physical concepts were not able to be explained in words, eventually laying the foundations for quantum theory as we know it today.
Happy Birthday, George de Hevesy
George de Hevesy is known for expanding the uses for X-ray florescence and radioactive isotopes, as well as discovering the chemical element hafnium.
Happy Birthday, Rosalind Franklin
Rosalind Franklin, an accomplished chemist and X-ray crystallographer, conducted research that changed how we understand DNA and virology.
Happy Birthday, Hendrik Lorentz
Hendrik Lorentz won the Nobel Prize for his work in electron theory, but that only one of the many contributions he made to theoretical physics, electromagnetism, and optics.
Happy Birthday, Jacob Perkins
Jacob Perkins was an American inventor and mechanical engineer. Most notably, he’s responsible for an appliance that we all have in our kitchens: the refrigerator.
Happy Birthday, Blaise Pascal
Blaise Pascal was a mathematician who wanted to make mathematical calculations easier. His work in projective geometry led to what is now known as Pascal’s theorem.
Happy Birthday, Henry Darcy
Henry Darcy was a civil engineer whose study of fluid dynamics led to the formulation of the equation now known as Darcy’s law. It also helped supply his small town in France with drinking water.
Happy Birthday, Gustave-Gaspard Coriolis
Gustave-Gaspard Coriolis’s research into mechanical systems has had far-reaching effects. In fact, the Coriolis effect is used to describe the rotation of Earth, which can be observed from space.
Happy Birthday, Inge Lehmann
Inge Lehmann was a Danish geophysicist and seismologist who used seismic waves generated by earthquakes to answer the age-old question: What’s really at the center of the earth?
Happy Birthday, Jean-Charles de Borda
Jean-Charles de Borda traveled the seas in the French military before making strides in the fields of fluid mechanics, geodesy, navigation, and more.
Happy Birthday, Claude Shannon
Claude Shannon ushered in a new age of communications technology, contributing ideas about testing digital circuits, coding messages in binary, and programming artificial intelligence.
Happy Birthday, Leonhard Euler
His last name is pronounced “oiler” and he is considered one of the greatest mathematical scientists of all time. Learn about the life and work of Leonhard Euler.