Learn about the history of science by reading about the significant scientific events that took place on this day in history.
1990 - Hubble Space Telescope placed in orbit.
NASA
The space shuttle Discovery placed the Hubble Space Telescope into Earth orbit. This orbital observatory is a joint European Space Agency and NASA project that has given astronomers and the public amazing observations of previously unseen objects in space. It was soon found the primary mirror was incorrectly prepared and did not give the resolution it was originally designed for. A future shuttle mission would correct this problem.
Hubble is scheduled to stay in service until 2013 when the James Webb Space Telescope is launched.
Hubble is scheduled to stay in service until 2013 when the James Webb Space Telescope is launched.
1900 - Wolfgang Pauli was born.
DOE/Fermi National Laboratory
Pauli was an Austrian physicist who discovered an atom's electrons each have their own unique quantum state. This is now known as the Pauli exclusion principle and would earn him the 1945 Nobel Prize in Physics.
He is also famous for the "Pauli Effect". Things would go wrong like experimental equipment would break down, vacuum tubes would burn out or mysterious malfunctions when he was in the vicinity. It happened enough times where his colleagues took notice and named the effect after him.
He is also famous for the "Pauli Effect". Things would go wrong like experimental equipment would break down, vacuum tubes would burn out or mysterious malfunctions when he was in the vicinity. It happened enough times where his colleagues took notice and named the effect after him.
1874 - Guglielmo Marconi was born.
Library of Congress
Marconi was an Italian inventor who is generally credited for the invention of radio. His invention of the wireless telegraph would earn him half the 1909 Nobel Prize in Physics and perhaps the most recognizable form of radio transmissions. Another claim for sending information without wires belongs to Nikola Tesla, who holds the US patent for radio. Sending radio information was being achieved fairly routinely in laboratory situations, but Marconi holds the earliest patent in Britain.
1873 - Félix d'Hérelle was born.
Wikipedia Commons
d'Hérelle was a French Canadian microbiologist who was one of the discoverers of bacteriophages, or viruses that infect bacteria.
1744 - Anders Celsius died.
Wikipedia Commons
Celsius was a Swedish astronomer who proposed a temperature scale that set 0° at the point where water boils and 100° at the point where water freezes. He called this scale 'centigrade' which was Latin for '100 steps'. After his death, Carolus Linnaeus reversed the endpoints and called the scale Celsius.
