1787 in science

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The year 1787 in science and technology involved some significant events.

Astronomy

• January 11 - William Herschel discovers Titania and Oberon, the first moons of Uranus found.

Biology

• William Curtis begins publication of The Botanical Magazine; or Flower-Garden Displayed in London. As Curtis's Botanical Magazine, it will still be published into the 21st century.
• Spanish physician Francisco Xavier Cid publishes Tarantismo Observado en España, a study of tarantulas and the tarantella as a cure for their bite.
• King George III of Great Britain, writing as Ralph Robinson of Windsor, contributes to Arthur Young's Annals of Agriculture.

Chemistry

• The element silicon is first identified by Antoine Lavoisier.
• Guyton de Morveau, Jean-Henri Hassenfratz, Antoine François, Antoine Lavoisier, Pierre Adet and Claude Berthollet publish Méthode de nomenclature chimique in Paris.

Physics

• Ernst Chladni publishes Entdeckungen über die Theorie des Klanges, demonstrating modes of vibration.

Surveying

• Principal Triangulation of Great Britain completed under the direction of General William Roy.

Technology

• June - William Symington patents improvements to the Watt steam engine.
• c. July - John Wilkinson launches an iron barge in the English Midlands.
• August 27 - Launching a 45-foot (14 m) steam-powered craft on the Delaware River, John Fitch demonstrates the first United States patent for his design.
• December 3 - James Rumsey demonstrates a water-jet propelled boat on the Potomac.
• First production of all-iron edge rail (for underground colliery rail transport), at Plymouth Ironworks, Merthyr Tydfil, South Wales.
• First introduction of a plateway, underground at Sheffield Park Colliery, Yorkshire, England, by John Curr.

Awards

• Copley Medal: John Hunter

Births

• March 6 - Joseph von Fraunhofer (d. 1826), physicist.
• March 8 - Karl Ferdinand von Graefe (d. 1840), surgeon.
• March 16 - Georg Ohm (d. 1854), physicist.
• June 7 - William Conybeare (d. 1857), English geologist.
• June 27 - Thomas Say (d. 1834), American naturalist.
• Undated
  • Josephine Kablick (d. 1863), Czech botanist and paleontologist.
  • Pierre Charles Alexandre Louis (d. 1872), French physician.

Deaths

• February 13 - Ruđer Bošković, Ragusan physicist, mathematician and astronomer (b. 1711)
• May 10 - William Watson, English physician, botanist and physicist (b. 1715)