1757 in science
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The year 1757 in science and technology involved some significant events.
Astronomy
- Nicolas Louis de Lacaille publishes his Astronomiae Fundamenta Novissimus, containing a standard catalogue of 398 bright stars with positions corrected for aberration and nutation.
- Tobias Mayer presents accurate tables of the Moon's motion to the Board of Longitude in Great Britain.
Chemistry
- Scottish physician Francis Home publishes The Principles of Agriculture and Vegetation, an early presentation of the chemical principles underlying plant nutrition, in Edinburgh.
Medicine
- December 8 – Opening of the "New Lying-In" or Rotunda Hospital in Dublin, designed by Richard Cassels.
- Albrecht von Haller begins publication of Elementa physiologiae corporis humani in Switzerland.
Physics
- Leonhard Euler publishes his equations for inviscid flow.
Technology
- London instrument maker John Bird makes the first navigational sextant.[1]
- Benjamin Franklin invents a three-wheel clock movement, which later leads to several variants in the design of pendulum clocks.
- The Grubenmann brothers complete timber arch bridges in Switzerland which include the longest vehicular bridge spans extant at this date:[2]
- Crossing the Rhine at Schaffhausen in two spans of 52 m and 59 m (by Hans Ulrich)
- A single-span of 67 m at Reichenau (by Johannes)
Awards
Births
- January 17 – John Gough, English natural philosopher (died 1825)
- May 24 – William Charles Wells, Scottish American physician (died 1817)
- June 22 – George Vancouver, English explorer (died 1798)
- July 11 – Johann Matthäus Bechstein, German naturalist (died 1822)
- August 9 – Thomas Telford, Scottish civil engineer (died 1834)
- November 12 – Robert Willan, English dermatologist (died 1812)
- date unknown - Agnes Ibbetson, English plant physiologist (died 1823)
Deaths
- January 9
- Louis Bertrand Castel, French Jesuit mathematician and physicist (born 1688)
- Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle, French scientific populariser (born 1657)
- August 28 – David Hartley, English physician and psychologist (born 1705)
- October 17 – René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur, French physicist (born 1683)
References
- ^ Moskowitz, Saul (1987). "The World's First Sextants" (PDF). Navigation. 34: 22–42.
- ^ Troyano, Leonardo Fernández (2003). Bridge Engineering: a Global Perspective. London: Thomas Telford Publishing. pp. 158–59. ISBN 0-7277-3215-3. Retrieved 2011-08-16.