Editing 1874 in science

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{{Science year nav|1874}}

The year '''1874 in [[science]]''' and [[technology]] involved some significant events, listed below.

==Astronomy==
* December 9 – a [[transit of Venus]] across the [[Sun]] is observed in Muddapur, India, by an astronomical expedition led by [[Pietro Tacchini]]

==Chemistry==
* [[Per Teodor Cleve]] discovers that [[didymium]] is in fact two elements, now known as ''[[neodymium]]'' and ''[[praseodymium]]''
* [[C. R. Alder Wright]] synthesizes [[heroin]]
* [[Othmar Zeidler]] synthesises [[DDT]]<ref>{{EHC-ref|id=009|name=DDT and its derivatives|date=1979|isbn=92-4-154069-9}}</ref>
* [[Carl Schorlemmer]] publishes ''[https://archive.org/details/amanualchemistr02schogoog <!-- quote=A Manual of Chemistry of the Carbon Compounds. --> A Manual of Chemistry of the Carbon Compounds; or, Organic Chemistry]''<ref>{{cite book|first=Tony|last=Crilly|title=50 Mathematical Ideas you really need to know|location=London|publisher=Quercus|year=2007|isbn=978-1-84724-008-8|page=116}}</ref>
* [[Jacobus van 't Hoff]] and [[Achille Le Bel]] independently propose that organic [[molecular model]]s can be three-dimensional<ref>{{cite book|title=The Foundations of Stereo Chemistry: Memoirs by Pasteur, van 't Hoff, Lebel and Wislicenus|url=https://archive.org/details/foundationsofste00richrich|location=New York|publisher=American Book Co.|year=1901}}</ref>

==Exploration==
* February – the [[Challenger expedition|''Challenger'' expedition]] provides geological evidence for the existence of the continent of [[Antarctica]]<ref>{{cite book|last=Jones|first=Max|title=The Last Great Quest|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2003|isbn=0-19-280483-9|pages=[https://archive.org/details/lastgreatquestca0000jone/page/56 56–57]|url=https://archive.org/details/lastgreatquestca0000jone/page/56}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|page=289|first=David|last=McGonigal|title=Antarctica: Secrets of the Southern Continent|location=London|publisher=Frances Lincoln|year=2009|isbn=0-7112-2980-5}}</ref>

==History of science==
* [[John William Draper]] publishes ''History of the Conflict between Religion and Science''

==Mathematics==
* [[Georg Cantor]]'s paper, "<!--no italics for essay titles that are entirely in another language-->{{Lang|de|Ueber<!--[sic; see 'Talk:Gottlob Frege#Ueber']--> eine Eigenschaft des Inbegriffes aller reellen algebraischen Zahlen}}" ("[[On a Property of the Collection of All Real Algebraic Numbers]]"), published in ''[[Crelle's Journal]]'', considered as the origin of [[set theory]]<ref>{{cite journal|last=Johnson|first=Phillip E.|year=1972|title=The Genesis and Development of Set Theory|journal=The Two-Year College Mathematics Journal|volume=3|issue=1|pages=55–62}}</ref>
* [[William Stanley Jevons]] publishes his comprehensive treatise on [[logic]], ''The Principles of Science''<ref>{{cite book|authorlink=Ivor Grattan-Guinness|last=Grattan-Guinness|first=Ivor|year=2000|title=The Search for Mathematical Roots, 1870–1940|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-0-691-05858-0}}</ref>
* [[Sofia Kovalevskaya]] is awarded a [[doctorate]] in mathematics at the [[University of Göttingen]], the first woman in Europe to hold that degree. Her submission includes a paper on [[partial differential equations]] containing a presentation of the [[Cauchy-Kovalevski theorem]]<ref>{{cite book|first=Roger|last=Cooke|title=The Mathematics of Sonya Kovalevskaya|url=https://archive.org/details/mathematicsofson0000cook|url-access=registration|location=New York|publisher=Springer-Verlag|year=1984|isbn=0-387-96030-9}}</ref>

==Medicine==
* April 1 – Dr [[Frances Hoggan|Frances Morgan]] marries Dr George Hoggan and they set up the first husband-and-wife [[General practitioner|general medical practice]] in the United Kingdom<ref>{{cite web|first=M. A.|last=Elston|title=Hoggan, Frances Elizabeth (1843–1927)|work=[[Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]]|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2004|url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/46422|accessdate=2012-06-22|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/46422}} {{ODNBsub}}</ref>
* Autumn – [[London School of Medicine for Women]] founded<ref>{{cite web|first=M. A.|last=Elston|title=Edinburgh Seven (act. 1869–1873)|work=Oxford Dictionary of National Biography|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2004|url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/61136|accessdate=2011-01-28}}</ref>
* [[A. T. Still]] introduces [[osteopathic medicine in the United States]]<ref>''Autobiography'' of A. T. Still. Rev. ed., Kirksille, MO (1908).</ref>

==Neuroscience==
* [[Vladimir Alekseyevich Betz]] describes giant [[pyramidal cell]]s in the [[motor cortex]], later called ''[[Betz cell]]s''

==Physics==
* [[James Clerk Maxwell]] produces a model of [[Maxwell's thermodynamic surface]]<ref>Maxwell, James Clerk; Harman, P. M. (2002), ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=JbNK9lRLHPEC&pg=PA148 The Scientific Letters and Papers of James Clerk Maxwell, Volume 3; 1874-1879]'', Cambridge University Press, {{ISBN|0-521-25627-5}}, p. 148: "I have just finished a clay model of a fancy surface, showing the solid, liquid, and gaseous states, and the continuity of liquid and gaseous states." (letter to [[Thomas Andrews (scientist)|Thomas Andrews]], November 1874).</ref>

==Psychology==
* [[Franz Brentano]] publishes ''Psychologie vom Empirischen Standpunkte'' (Psychology from an Empirical Standpoint)

==Technology==
* May 20 – [[Levi Strauss]] and [[Jacob Davis (inventor)|Jacob Davis]] receive a United States [[patent]] for blue denim [[jeans]] with copper rivets
* July 1 – [[Sholes and Glidden typewriter]], with cylindrical platen and [[QWERTY]] keyboard, first marketed, in the United States
* July 4 – official opening of [[Eads Bridge]] (combined road and rail steel arch) over the [[Mississippi River]] at St. Louis, Missouri, designed by [[James B. Eads]]. It is the longest arch bridge in the world at this time, with an overall length of 6,442 feet (1,964 m); the first use of true steel as a primary structural material in a major bridge project;<ref>{{cite web|last=DeLony|first=Eric|title=Context for World Heritage Bridges|publisher=[[International Council on Monuments and Sites]]|url=http://www.icomos.org/studies/bridges.htm|accessdate=2007-02-06|archivedate=9 June 2007|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20070609163211/http://www.icomos.org/studies/bridges.htm}}</ref> the first built using [[cantilever]] support methods exclusively; and the first major project to make use of [[caisson (engineering)|pneumatic caissons]]
* Invention of [[barbed wire]] by [[Joseph Glidden]]

==Awards==
* [[Copley Medal]]: [[Louis Pasteur]]<ref>{{cite web |title=Copley Medal {{!}} British scientific award |url=https://www.britannica.com/science/Copley-Medal |website=Encyclopedia Britannica |accessdate=23 July 2020 |language=en}}</ref>
* [[Wollaston Medal]]: [[Oswald Heer]]

==Births==
* January 22 – [[Leonard Eugene Dickson]] (died [[1954 in science|1954]]), American [[mathematician]]
* February 2 – [[Ernest Shackleton]] (died [[1922 in science|1922]]), Anglo-Irish Antarctic [[List of explorers|explorer]]
* April 25 – [[Guglielmo Marconi]] (died [[1937 in science|1937]]), Italian [[inventor]]
* September 12 – [[Redcliffe N. Salaman]] (died [[1955 in science|1955]]), English [[botanist]]
* September 26 – [[Oakes Ames (botanist)|Oakes Ames]] (died [[1950 in science|1950]]), American botanist
* October 13 – [[Kiyotsugu Hirayama]] (died [[1943 in science|1943]]), Italian [[astronomer]]
* November 27 – [[Chaim Weizmann]] (died [[1952 in science|1952]]), Russian-born [[chemist]] and first [[President of Israel]]
* November 29 – [[António Egas Moniz]] (died [[1955 in science|1955]]), Portuguese neurologist, winner of the 1949 [[Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine]]
* December 6 – [[Elizabeth Laird (physicist)|Elizabeth Laird]] (died [[1969 in science|1969]]), Canadian [[physicist]]
* December 28 – [[Arthur Schüller]] (died [[1957 in science|1957]]), Austrian-born [[neuroradiologist]]

==Deaths==
* January 16 – [[Max Schultze]] (born [[1825 in science|1825]]), German [[physiologist]]
* January 24 – [[Johann Philipp Reis]] (born [[1834 in science|1834]]), German physicist and inventor
* February 17 – [[Adolphe Quetelet]] (born [[1796 in science|1796]]), Belgian mathematician and astronomer
* February 19 – [[Carl Ernst Bock]] (born [[1809 in science|1809]]), German [[physician]] and [[anatomist]]
* March 3 – [[Forbes Winslow]] (born [[1810 in science|1810]]), English [[psychiatrist]]
* March 10 – [[Moritz von Jacobi]] (born [[1801 in science|1801]]), German-born electrical engineer
* March 14 – [[Johann Heinrich von Mädler]] (born [[1794 in science|1794]]), German astronomer
* March 28 – [[Peter Andreas Hansen]] (born [[1795 in science|1795]]), Danish-born German astronomer
* April 13 – [[James Bogardus]] (born [[1800 in science|1800]]), American inventor
* November 21 – [[Sir William Jardine, 7th Baronet]] (born 1800), Scottish-born [[naturalist]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

[[Category:1874 in science| ]]
[[Category:19th century in science]]
[[Category:1870s in science]]