The year 1775 in science and technology involved some significant events.

Events in 1775

February 21 - La Specola, Florence's Museum of Zoology and Natural History, opens to the public.

Chemistry

May 25 - Joseph Priestley's account of his isolation of oxygen in the form of a gas ("dephlogisticated air") is read to the Royal Society of London.[1]

Mathematics

Lagrange's Recherches d'Arithmétique develops a general theory of binary quadratic forms.

Medicine

Percivall Pott finds the first occupational link to cancer, contributing to the science of epidemiology.

Natural history

Johann Christian Fabricius publishes his Systema entomologiæ.
Peter Forsskål's Descriptiones Animalium: Avium, amphiborum, insectorum, vermium quæ in itinere orientali (containing early observations on bird migration) and Flora Ægyptiaco-Arabica sive descriptiones plantarum quas per Ægyptum Inferiorem et Arabiam felicem detexit are published posthumously, edited by Carsten Niebuhr.[2]

Technology

James Watt's 1769 steam engine patent is extended to June 1800 by Act of Parliament of Great Britain and the first engines are built under it.[3][4]
Jacques-Constantin Périer operates a paddle steamer on the Seine, but it proves to be underpowered.[5]
Thomas Crapper patents a flush toilet in London.[6]
Pierre-Simon Girard, age 74, invents a water turbine.
December 30 - John Arnold takes out his first patent for improvements in the construction of marine chronometers in Britain, including the first for a compensation balance.[7]

Awards

Copley Medal: Nevil Maskelyne

Births

January 22 - André-Marie Ampère, French physicist (d. 1836)
February 9 - Farkas Bolyai, Hungarian mathematician (d. 1856)
May 10 - William Phillips, English geologist (d. 1828)
23 July 1775 Birth of Etienne-Louis Malus , French physicist and mathematician] (d. 1812)
September 30 - Robert Adrain, Irish-born mathematician (d. 1843)
November 19 - Johann Karl Wilhelm Illiger, German entomologist and zoologist (d. 1813)

Deaths

March 3 - Richard Dunthorne, English astronomer (b. 1711)
October 25 - Johan Maurits Mohr, Dutch astronomer (b. 1716)

References

^ Priestley, Joseph (1775). "An Account of Further Discoveries in Air". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society 65: 384–94. JSTOR 106209.
^ "The University of Copenhagen - A Danish centre of learning since 1479". Københavns Universitet. Retrieved 2011-05-19.
^ Scherer, F. M. (1965). "Invention and Innovation in the Watt-Boulton Steam-Engine Venture". Technology and Culture 6: 165–87. JSTOR 3101072.
^ "The Invention of the Steam Engine: The Life of James Watt. Part 4: The Steam Engine Gains Popularity". About.com Inventors. Retrieved 2011-02-25.
^ Griffin, H. Philip (1958). The Birth of the Steamboat. London. p. 35.
^ "The Development of the Flushing Toilet - Detailed Chronology 1596 onwards". Stoke-on-Trent: Twyfords Bathrooms.
^ No. 1113. Betts, Jonathan (2004). "Arnold, John (1735/6–1799)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/677. Retrieved 2012-03-09. subscription or UK public library membership required