1922 in science
Encyclopedia
The year 1922 in science
and technology
involved some significant events, listed below.
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
and technology
Technology
Technology is the making, usage, and knowledge of tools, machines, techniques, crafts, systems or methods of organization in order to solve a problem or perform a specific function. It can also refer to the collection of such tools, machinery, and procedures. The word technology comes ;...
involved some significant events, listed below.
Archaeology
- November 4 - BritishUnited KingdomThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
archaeologist Howard CarterHoward Carter (archaeologist)Howard Carter was an English archaeologist and Egyptologist, noted as a primary discoverer of the tomb of Tutankhamun.-Beginning of career:...
and his men find the entrance to King Tutankhamen's tomb in the Valley of the KingsValley of the KingsThe Valley of the Kings , less often called the Valley of the Gates of the Kings , is a valley in Egypt where, for a period of nearly 500 years from the 16th to 11th century BC, tombs were constructed for the Pharaohs and powerful nobles of the New Kingdom .The valley stands on the west bank of...
of EgyptEgyptEgypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
.
Biology
- H.J. Muller sets out the basic properties of genetic heredity.
- Last known wild Barbary lionBarbary LionThe Barbary lion , also known as the Atlas lion or Nubian lion, is a subspecies of lion that became extinct in the wild or extinct in the 20th century....
(P. l. leo) shot in the Atlas MountainsAtlas MountainsThe Atlas Mountains is a mountain range across a northern stretch of Africa extending about through Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia. The highest peak is Toubkal, with an elevation of in southwestern Morocco. The Atlas ranges separate the Mediterranean and Atlantic coastlines from the Sahara Desert...
of MoroccoMoroccoMorocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...
.
Chemistry
- June 20 - DegeschDegeschThe Deutsche Gesellschaft für Schädlingsbekämpfung mbH , in short Degesch, was a German chemical corporation during World War II. Degesch produced pesticides used against weeds and insects...
applies to patentPatentA patent is a form of intellectual property. It consists of a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for the public disclosure of an invention....
the cyanideCyanideA cyanide is a chemical compound that contains the cyano group, -C≡N, which consists of a carbon atom triple-bonded to a nitrogen atom. Cyanides most commonly refer to salts of the anion CN−. Most cyanides are highly toxic....
-based insecticideInsecticideAn insecticide is a pesticide used against insects. They include ovicides and larvicides used against the eggs and larvae of insects respectively. Insecticides are used in agriculture, medicine, industry and the household. The use of insecticides is believed to be one of the major factors behind...
Zyklon BZyklon BZyklon B was the trade name of a cyanide-based pesticide infamous for its use by Nazi Germany to kill human beings in gas chambers of extermination camps during the Holocaust. The "B" designation indicates one of two types of Zyklon...
(credited to Walter Heerdt) in GermanyGermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. - CzechCzech peopleCzechs, or Czech people are a western Slavic people of Central Europe, living predominantly in the Czech Republic. Small populations of Czechs also live in Slovakia, Austria, the United States, the United Kingdom, Chile, Argentina, Canada, Germany, Russia and other countries...
chemist Jaroslav HeyrovskýJaroslav HeyrovskýJaroslav Heyrovský was a Czech chemist and inventor. Heyrovský was the inventor of the polarographic method, father of the electroanalytical method, and recipient of the Nobel Prize in 1959...
invents polarographic methodsPolarographyPolarography is a subclass of voltammetry where the working electrode is a dropping mercury electrode or a static mercury drop electrode ., useful for its wide cathodic range and renewable surface...
of chemical analysis.
Mathematics
- First publication of Ludwig WittgensteinLudwig WittgensteinLudwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein was an Austrian philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. He was professor in philosophy at the University of Cambridge from 1939 until 1947...
's Tractatus Logico-PhilosophicusTractatus Logico-PhilosophicusThe Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus is the only book-length philosophical work published by the Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein in his lifetime. It was an ambitious project: to identify the relationship between language and reality and to define the limits of science...
in an EnglishEnglish languageEnglish is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
translation.
Paleontology
- First of four successive American Museum of Natural HistoryAmerican Museum of Natural HistoryThe American Museum of Natural History , located on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City, United States, is one of the largest and most celebrated museums in the world...
expeditions to MongoliaMongoliaMongolia is a landlocked country in East and Central Asia. It is bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south, east and west. Although Mongolia does not share a border with Kazakhstan, its western-most point is only from Kazakhstan's eastern tip. Ulan Bator, the capital and largest...
under Roy Chapman AndrewsRoy Chapman AndrewsRoy Chapman Andrews was an American explorer, adventurer and naturalist who became the director of the American Museum of Natural History. He is primarily known for leading a series of expeditions through the fragmented China of the early 20th century into the Gobi Desert and Mongolia...
which will discover fossils of Indricotherium (a gigantic hornless rhinocerosRhinocerosRhinoceros , also known as rhino, is a group of five extant species of odd-toed ungulates in the family Rhinocerotidae. Two of these species are native to Africa and three to southern Asia....
then named "Baluchitherium"), ProtoceratopsProtoceratopsProtoceratops is a genus of sheep-sized herbivorous ceratopsian dinosaur, from the Upper Cretaceous Period of what is now Mongolia. It was a member of the Protoceratopsidae, a group of early horned dinosaurs...
, a nestNestA nest is a place of refuge to hold an animal's eggs or provide a place to live or raise offspring. They are usually made of some organic material such as twigs, grass, and leaves; or may simply be a depression in the ground, or a hole in a tree, rock or building...
of Protoceratops eggsEgg (biology)An egg is an organic vessel in which an embryo first begins to develop. In most birds, reptiles, insects, molluscs, fish, and monotremes, an egg is the zygote, resulting from fertilization of the ovum, which is expelled from the body and permitted to develop outside the body until the developing...
(found in 1995 to be from OviraptorOviraptorOviraptor is a genus of small Mongolian theropod dinosaur, first discovered by the paleontologist Roy Chapman Andrews, and first described by Henry Fairfield Osborn, in 1924...
), PinacosaurusPinacosaurusPinacosaurus is a genus of medium-sized ankylosaur dinosaurs that lived from the late Santonian to the late Campanian stages of the late Cretaceous Period , in Mongolia and China...
, SaurornithoidesSaurornithoidesSaurornithoides is a genus of troodontid maniraptoran dinosaur, living during the Late Cretaceous period. These creatures were predators, which could run fast on their hind legs and had excellent sight and hearing...
, Oviraptor and VelociraptorVelociraptorVelociraptor is a genus of dromaeosaurid theropod dinosaur that existed approximately 75 to 71 million years ago during the later part of the Cretaceous Period. Two species are currently recognized, although others have been assigned in the past. The type species is V. mongoliensis; fossils...
, none of which were known before.
Physics
- Arthur ComptonArthur ComptonArthur Holly Compton was an American physicist and Nobel laureate in physics for his discovery of the Compton effect. He served as Chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis from 1945 to 1953.-Early years:...
studies X-ray photon scatteringScatteringScattering is a general physical process where some forms of radiation, such as light, sound, or moving particles, are forced to deviate from a straight trajectory by one or more localized non-uniformities in the medium through which they pass. In conventional use, this also includes deviation of...
by electrons. - Otto SternOtto SternOtto Stern was a German physicist and Nobel laureate in physics.-Biography:Stern was born in Sohrau, now Żory in the German Empire's Kingdom of Prussia and studied at Breslau, now Wrocław in Lower Silesia....
and Walther Gerlach show "space quantization". - Hilding FaxénHilding FaxénOlov Hilding Faxén was a Swedish physicist who was primarily active within mechanics.Faxén received his doctorate in 1921 at Uppsala University with the thesis Einwirkung der Gefässwände auf den Widerstand gegen die Bewegung einer kleinen Kugel in einer zähen Flüssigkeit Olov Hilding Faxén (March...
introduces Faxén's law for the velocity of a sphere in fluid dynamicsFluid dynamicsIn physics, fluid dynamics is a sub-discipline of fluid mechanics that deals with fluid flow—the natural science of fluids in motion. It has several subdisciplines itself, including aerodynamics and hydrodynamics...
.
Technology
- November 22 - The British Broadcasting CompanyBritish Broadcasting CompanyThe British Broadcasting Company Ltd was a British commercial company formed on 18 October 1922 by British and American electrical companies doing business in the United Kingdom and licensed by the British General Post Office...
(BBCBBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
) begins broadcasting a radioRadioRadio is the transmission of signals through free space by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...
service in the United KingdomUnited KingdomThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
from station 2LO2LO2LO was the second radio station to regularly broadcast in the United Kingdom . It began broadcasting on 11 May 1922, for one hour a day from the seventh floor of Marconi House in London's Strand...
.
Awards
- Nobel PrizeNobel PrizeThe Nobel Prizes are annual international awards bestowed by Scandinavian committees in recognition of cultural and scientific advances. The will of the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, established the prizes in 1895...
- PhysicsNobel Prize in PhysicsThe Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded once a year by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the will of Alfred Nobel in 1895 and awarded since 1901; the others are the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Nobel Prize in Literature, Nobel Peace Prize, and...
- Niels BohrNiels BohrNiels Henrik David Bohr was a Danish physicist who made foundational contributions to understanding atomic structure and quantum mechanics, for which he received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922. Bohr mentored and collaborated with many of the top physicists of the century at his institute in... - ChemistryNobel Prize in ChemistryThe Nobel Prize in Chemistry is awarded annually by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences to scientists in the various fields of chemistry. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the will of Alfred Nobel in 1895, awarded for outstanding contributions in chemistry, physics, literature,...
- Francis William AstonFrancis William AstonFrancis William Aston was a British chemist and physicist who won the 1922 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his discovery, by means of his mass spectrograph, of isotopes, in a large number of non-radioactive elements, and for his enunciation of the whole-number rule... - Physiology or MedicineNobel Prize in Physiology or MedicineThe Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine administered by the Nobel Foundation, is awarded once a year for outstanding discoveries in the field of life science and medicine. It is one of five Nobel Prizes established in 1895 by Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, in his will...
- Archibald Vivian Hill and Otto Fritz MeyerhofOtto Fritz Meyerhof-External links:* *...
- Physics
Births
- July 18 - Thomas KuhnThomas KuhnThomas Samuel Kuhn was an American historian and philosopher of science whose controversial 1962 book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions was deeply influential in both academic and popular circles, introducing the term "paradigm shift," which has since become an English-language staple.Kuhn...
(d. 19961996 in scienceThe year 1996 in science and technology involved many significant events, listed below.-Astronomy and space exploration:* January 30 – Comet Hyakutake is discovered.* February 17 – NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft launched...
), philosopher of science. - November 8 - Christiaan BarnardChristiaan BarnardChristiaan Neethling Barnard was a South African cardiac surgeon who performed the world's first successful human-to-human heart transplant.- Early life :...
(d. 20012001 in scienceThe year 2001 in science and technology involved many events, some of which are included below.-Astronomy and space exploration:* The NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft lands in the "saddle" region of 433 Eros, becoming the first spacecraft to land on an asteroid....
), surgeonSurgerySurgery is an ancient medical specialty that uses operative manual and instrumental techniques on a patient to investigate and/or treat a pathological condition such as disease or injury, or to help improve bodily function or appearance.An act of performing surgery may be called a surgical...
.
Deaths
- January 5 - Ernest ShackletonErnest ShackletonSir Ernest Henry Shackleton, CVO, OBE was a notable explorer from County Kildare, Ireland, who was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration...
(b. 18741874 in scienceThe 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:...
), explorer. - January 15 - Edward HopkinsonEdward HopkinsonEdward Hopkinson was a British electrical engineer and Conservative politician.He was the fourth son of John Hopkinson, an engineer who was mayor of Manchester in 1882/83. Hopkinson was educated at Owen's College, Manchester and Emmanuel College, Cambridge. He graduated from Emmanuel in 1881 and...
(b. 18591859 in scienceThe year 1859 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Astronomy:* August 28–September 2 - The solar storm of 1859, the largest geomagnetic solar storm on record, causes the Northern lights aurora to be visible as far south as Cuba and knocks out telegraph...
), electrical engineer. - January 22 - Camille JordanCamille JordanMarie Ennemond Camille Jordan was a French mathematician, known both for his foundational work in group theory and for his influential Cours d'analyse. He was born in Lyon and educated at the École polytechnique...
(b. 18381838 in scienceThe year 1838 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Astronomy:* Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel makes the first accurate measurement of distance to a star, 61 Cygni, using parallax...
), mathematicianMathematicianA mathematician is a person whose primary area of study is the field of mathematics. Mathematicians are concerned with quantity, structure, space, and change....
. - April 1 - Hermann RorschachHermann RorschachHermann Rorschach was a Swiss Freudian psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, best known for developing a projective test known as the Rorschach inkblot test. This test was reportedly designed to reflect unconscious parts of the personality that "project" onto the stimuli...
(b. 18841884 in scienceThe year 1884 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Chemistry:* J. H. van 't Hoff proposes the Arrhenius equation for the temperature dependence of the reaction rate constant, and therefore, rate of a chemical reaction....
), psychiatristPsychiatristA psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. All psychiatrists are trained in diagnostic evaluation and in psychotherapy...
. - April 9 - Sir Patrick MansonPatrick MansonSir Patrick Manson was a Scottish physician who made important discoveries in parasitology and was the founder of the tropical medicine field....
(b. 18441844 in scienceThe year 1844 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Astronomy:* Friedrich Bessel explains the wobbling motions of Sirius and Procyon by suggesting that these stars have dark companions.-Biology:...
), the "father of tropical medicineTropical medicineTropical medicine is the branch of medicine that deals with health problems that occur uniquely, are more widespread, or prove more difficult to control in tropical and subtropical regions....
". - May 26 - Ernest SolvayErnest SolvayErnest Gaston Joseph Solvay was a Belgian chemist, industrialist and philanthropist.Born at Rebecq, he was prevented by acute pleurisy from going to university...
, (b. 18381838 in scienceThe year 1838 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Astronomy:* Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel makes the first accurate measurement of distance to a star, 61 Cygni, using parallax...
), chemistChemistA chemist is a scientist trained in the study of chemistry. Chemists study the composition of matter and its properties such as density and acidity. Chemists carefully describe the properties they study in terms of quantities, with detail on the level of molecules and their component atoms...
. - June 18 - Jacobus KapteynJacobus KapteynJacobus Cornelius Kapteyn, was a Dutch astronomer, best known for his extensive studies of the Milky Way and as the first discoverer of evidence for galactic rotation....
(b. 18511851 in scienceThe year 1851 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Astronomy:* February - First public exhibition of a Foucault pendulum, at the Meridian of the Paris Observatory, demonstrating the Earth's rotation...
), astronomerAstronomerAn astronomer is a scientist who studies celestial bodies such as planets, stars and galaxies.Historically, astronomy was more concerned with the classification and description of phenomena in the sky, while astrophysics attempted to explain these phenomena and the differences between them using...
. - August 2 - Alexander Graham BellAlexander Graham BellAlexander Graham Bell was an eminent scientist, inventor, engineer and innovator who is credited with inventing the first practical telephone....
(b. 18471847 in scienceThe year 1847 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Chemistry:* Nitroglycerin, at first called pyroglycerine, first synthesized by Ascanio Sobrero.-Mathematics:...
), inventor. - August 18 - W. H. Hudson (b. 18411841 in scienceThe year 1841 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Biology:* Rev. Miles Joseph Berkeley demonstrates that Phytophthora infestans is a fungal infection....
), naturalistNaturalistNaturalist may refer to:* Practitioner of natural history* Conservationist* Advocate of naturalism * Naturalist , autobiography-See also:* The American Naturalist, periodical* Naturalism...
. - August 29 - Sophie BryantSophie BryantSophie Bryant was an Anglo-Irish mathematician, educator, feminist and activist.She was the daughter of Revd Dr William Willock DD, Fellow and Tutor of Trinity College, Dublin...
(b. 18501850 in scienceThe year 1850 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.-Chemistry:* October 17 - James Young patents a method of distilling paraffin from coal.-Mathematics:* Thomas Kirkman proposes Kirkman's schoolgirl problem.* J. J...
), mathematician and educationalist (in a hiking accident).