The 1900s Science and Technology: Chronology
The 1900s Science and Technology: Chronology
1900: Thomas Alva Edison invents the nickel-based alkaline storage battery.
1900: German scientists invent the modern pendulum seismograph to detect earthquakes.
1900: Sigmund Freud's On the Interpretation of Dreams is published.
1900: July 2 The first Zeppelin dirigible is flown in Germany.
1900: December 14 Max Planck, a German physicist, announces the basis of quantum theory: Light rays are emitted in discrete amounts called quanta.
1901: General Electric establishes the first corporate research laboratory.
1901: Andrew Carnegie announces his intention to donate $10 million to promote scientific research.
1901: Brothers Orville and Wilbur Wright begin glider flights to study the aerodynamics of flight.
1901: Hugo de Vries, a Dutch biologist, publishes his theory of genetic mutation.
1901: December 12 Guglielmo Marconi receives the first transatlantic radio transmission.
1902: The lawn mower and vacuum cleaner are invented in England.
1902: Arthur Korn, a German inventor, develops the photofacsimile machine, which transmits photographs by telegraph.
1902: Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist and psychologist, discovers conditioned reflexes.
1902: Richard Zsigmondy, a German chemist, invents the ultramicroscope.
1902: British physicists Ernest Rutherford and Frederick Soddy explain radioactivity as the disintegration of atomic structures.
1903: Reginald Fessenden discovers the electrolytic radio detector, a machine capable of receiving the human voice.
1903: The safety razor is invented
1903: Edison perfects a technique for producing master record molds, called electroplating.
1903: Bertrand Russell, an English philosopher, publishes The Principles of Mathematics, which attempts to reduce pure mathematics to a limited number of concepts.
1903: December 17 The Wright brothers successfully take flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.
1904: The Panama Canal construction project begins.
1904: John Fleming invents the diode vacuum tube, which converts an alternating electric current into a one-way signal.
1904: Charles Perrine discovers the sixth moon of Jupiter.
1904: Phonograph records replace Edison's wax cylinders in sound recording.
1904: The United States Engineering Society is founded.
1905: Albert Einstein publishes several important papers on the theory of relativity, Brownian motion, and the photoelectric effect.
1905: German physicist Philipp Lenard is awarded the Nobel Prize in physics for his discovery of cathode rays.
1905: The German Navy launches the first U-boat submarine.
1905: Ernest Starling, an English physiologist, coins the term "hormone" to identify chemical messengers produced by the endocrine glands.
1906: Thaddeus Cahill invents telharmonium, a type of telephonic organ.
1906: The Nobel Prize in physics is awarded to scientist J.J. Thomson for his discovery of the electron.
1906: December 24 The first radio broadcast originates from Brant Rock, Massachusetts.
1906: December 31 Lee De Forest invents the triode vacuum tube, which made possible the transmission of human voice, music, and other broadcast signals via wireless telephony.
1907: The first helicopter flight takes place in France.
1907: Albert Michelson becomes the first American Nobel laureate when he wins the Nobel Prize in physics for measuring the speed of light.
1908: The electric razor is invented.
1908: George Ellery Hale discovers magnetic fields in sunspots.
1908: The Ford Motor Company introduces the Model T, or "Tin Lizzie," the most popular of the early automobiles.
1908: Dutch physicist Heike Kamerlingh Onnes produces liquid helium.
1908: The Holt Company introduces the first tractor with moving treads.
1908: December 21 Wilbur Wright flies seventy-seven miles in two hours and twenty minutes, winning the Michelin Cup in France.
1909: The terms gene, genotype, and phenotype are introduced by biologist Wilhelm Johannsen.
1909: April 6 U.S. Navy commander Robert Peary reaches the North Pole.
1909: September Psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud makes his only visit to the United States, to lecture at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts.
1909: November 24 Celebrations in England and the United States mark the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origins of Species and the centennial of Darwin's birth.