The year 1791 in science and technology involved some significant events.

Biology

Jean Baptiste François Pierre Bulliard begins publication of Histoire des champignons de la France, a significant text in mycology.
Luigi Galvani publishes his discoveries in "animal electricity" (Galvanism).[1]

Chemistry

Nicolas Leblanc patents the Leblanc process for the production of soda ash (sodium carbonate) from common salt (sodium chloride).
The element Titanium is discovered included in ilmenite in Cornwall, England, by local amateur geologist Rev. William Gregor.[2]

Physics

Pierre Prévost shows that all bodies radiate heat, no matter how hot or cold they are.

Technology

James Rumsey is granted a patent related to fluid power engineering, in England.[3]

Publications

Sir John Sinclair's Statistical Account of Scotland begins publication, introducing the term Statistics into English.[4]

Awards

Copley Medal: James Rennell; Jean-André Deluc

Births

16 February 1791 Birth of Claude Servais Mathias Pouillet

March 20 - John Farey, English mechanical engineer and technical writer (d. 1851)
April 9 - George Peacock, English mathematician (d. 1858)
April 27 - Samuel F. B. Morse, American inventor (d. 1872)
July 13 - Allan Cunningham, English botanist and explorer (d. 1839)
September 4 - Robert Knox, Scottish anatomist (d. 1862)
22 September 1791 Birth of Michael Faraday, English chemist and physicist (d. 1867)
September 23 - Johann Franz Encke, German astronomer (d. 1865)

2 October 1791 Birth of Alexis Thérèse Petit
December 26 - Charles Babbage, English mathematician and inventor of computing machines (d. 1871)

30 June 1791 Birth of Félix Savart

Deaths

July 24 - Ignaz von Born, Hungarian metallurgist (b. 1742)

27 August 1791 Death of Placidus Fixlmillner in Krensmünster, (Austria),

References

^ In the treatise "De viribus electricitatis in motu musculari commentarius" ("Commentary on the Force of Electricity on Muscular Motion") published in the proceedings of the Institute of Sciences at Bologna (vol. 7) and separately at Modena the following year.
^ Reported to the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall and in Crell's Annalen. Emsley, John (2001). "Titanium". Nature's Building Blocks: An A-Z Guide to the Elements. Oxford University Press. p. 452. ISBN 0-19-850340-7.
^ British patent no. 1825.
^ Ball, Philip (2004). Critical Mass. Farrar, Straus & Giroux. p. 53. ISBN 0-374-53041-6.