1929 in science

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The year 1929 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

Astronomy and space exploration

• July 17 - Robert H. Goddard tests the first rocket to carry scientific instruments (a barometer and a camera).
• Clyde Tombaugh discovers several asteroids: 2839 Annette, 3583 Burdett, 3824 Brendalee, 1929 VS, 1929 VD1.
• Edwin Hubble publishes his discovery that the speed at which galaxies recede positively correlates with their distance, which becomes known as Hubble's law, the basis for understanding that the universe is expanding.
• George Gamow proposes hydrogen fusion as the energy source for stars.
• Konstantin Tsiolkovsky proposes the construction of staged rockets in his book Космические поезда (Cosmic Trains).

Aviation

• July 5 - The Curtiss-Wright corporation is founded.
• August 8–29 - The German airship Graf Zeppelin makes a round-the-world flight.
• September 24 - Jimmy Doolittle takes off, flies over a set course, and lands by flight instruments alone.
• November 29 - US Admiral Richard Byrd becomes the first person to fly over the South Pole.
• December 5 - Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation is founded.

Biochemistry

• Carl and Gerty Cori propose the Cori cycle, describing how the human body processes carbohydrates.

Biology

• C. B. van Niel makes the first announcement of his discovery that photosynthesis is a light-dependent redox reaction.
• Professor Frederick Gericke of the University of California, Los Angeles, demonstrates that plants can be grown soil-free all the way to maturity, the basis of hydroponics.

Chemistry

• Sir John Lennard-Jones introduces his linear combination of atomic orbitals molecular orbital method for approximation of molecular orbitals.
• Lars Onsager publishes his reciprocal relations equations in thermodynamics, for which he will receive the 1968 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

Communications

• June 27 - The first public demonstration of color television is held by Herbert E. Ives and colleagues at AT&T's Bell Telephone Laboratories in New York. The first images are a bouquet of roses and an American flag. A mechanical system is used to transmit 50-line images to Washington.
• First practical coaxial cable patented by Lloyd Espenschied and Herman Affel of Bell Labs.
• Rudolf Hell receives a patent for the Hellschreiber, an early fax machine.

Geology

• November 18 - Grand Banks earthquake: Off the south coast of Newfoundland in the Atlantic Ocean, a Richter magnitude 7.2 submarine earthquake centered on Grand Banks, breaks 12 submarine transatlantic telegraph cables and triggers a tsunami that destroys many south coast communities in the Burin Peninsula area.

History of science

• October 21 - Henry Ford's Edison Institute is inaugurated at Dearborn, Michigan on the 50th anniversary of the invention of the incandescent light bulb, in the presence of President of the United States Herbert Hoover, Thomas Edison, Walter Chrysler, Marie Curie, George Eastman and Orville Wright (among others).

Mathematics

• Kurt Gödel proves his completeness theorem.

Medicine

• Alexander Fleming publishes an article about penicillin in the British Journal of Experimental Pathology, for which he will receive the 1945 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

Meteorology

• January 7 - Robert Bureau flies (and names) the first radiosonde using telemetry, in France.

Physics

• Robert J. Van de Graaff develops the Van de Graaff generator.
• Oskar Klein discovers the Klein paradox.
• Oskar Klein and Y. Nishina derive the Klein-Nishina cross section for high energy photon scattering by electrons.
• Sir Nevill Francis Mott derives the Mott cross section for the Coulomb scattering of relativistic electrons.
• Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac and Werner Karl Heisenberg develop the quantum theory of ferromagnetism.
• Ernest O. Lawrence invents the cyclotron, for which he will receive the 1939 Nobel Prize in Physics.

Awards

• Nobel Prize
  • Physics: Prince Louis-Victor Pierre Raymond de Broglie
  • Chemistry: Arthur Harden, Hans Karl August Simon von Euler-Chelpin
  • Physiology or Medicine: Christiaan Eijkman, Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins

Births

• January 3 - Gordon Moore, American computing entrepreneur and scientific benefactor.
• January 29 - John Polanyi, German-born Canadian winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
• January 31 - Rudolf Mössbauer (d. 2011), German winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics.
• April 5 - Ivar Giaever, Norwegian winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics.
• April 22 - Michael Atiyah, British mathematician.
• May 6 - Paul Lauterbur (d. 2007), American chemist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
• June 3 - Werner Arber, Swiss microbiologist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
• June 10 - E. O. Wilson, American entomologist.
• July 1 - Gerald Edelman, American microbiologist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
• September 5 - Andrian Nikolayev (d. 2004), Chuvash cosmonaut.
• September 15 - Murray Gell-Mann, American winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics.
• November 2 - Richard E. Taylor, Canadian American winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics.
• November 7 - Eric R. Kandel, Austrian-born neuropsychiatrist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
• November 24 - Franciszek Kokot, Polish nephrologist.

Deaths

• February 3 - A. K. Erlang (b. 1878), Danish mathematician.
• March 6 - David Dunbar Buick (b. 1854), Scottish American automobile pioneer.
• April 4 - Karl Benz (b. 1844), German automotive pioneer and mechanical engineer
• August 10 - Pierre Fatou (b. 1878), French mathematician.
• August 27 - Herman Potočnik Noordung (b. 1892), Slovene pioneer of astronautics and cosmonautics.
• November 17 - Herman Hollerith (b. 1860), American statistician, punched card data processing inventor.