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The year 1797 in science and technology involved some significant events.

Chemistry

  • Smithson Tennant demonstrates that diamond is a pure form of carbon.
  • Louis Nicolas Vauquelin discovers chromium.
  • Joseph Proust proposes the law of definite proportions, which states that elements always combine in small, whole number ratios to form compounds.

Mathematics

  • Lagrange publishes his Théorie des fonctions analytiques.

Physics

  • Giovanni Battista Venturi describes the Venturi effect.

Technology

  • October 22 – André-Jacques Garnerin carries out the first descent using a frameless parachute, a (3,200 feet) drop from a balloon in Paris.
  • English naval engineer Samuel Bentham applies for patents covering several machines to produce wood veneers; in his patent applications, he describes the concept of laminating several layers of veneer with glue to form a thicker piece – the first description of what in modern times becomes known as plywood.

Zoology

  • Thomas Bewick publishes the first volume, Land Birds, of his History of British Birds.

Awards

  • Copley Medal: Not awarded

Births

right|thumb|[[Frederick William Hope]]

thumb|right|[[Charles Lyell]]

  • January 3 – Frederick William Hope, British zoologist (died 1862)
  • January 4 – Wilhelm Beer, Prussian astronomer (died 1850)
  • February – Joseph-Alphonse Adhémar, French mathematician (died 1862)
  • February 2 – Joseph Guislain, Flemish psychiatrist (died 1860)
  • February 5 – Jean-Marie Duhamel, French mathematician and physicist (died 1872)
  • March 10 – George Poulett Scrope, British geologist and economist (died 1876)
  • March 21 – Johann Andreas Wagner, German paleontologist, zoologist and archeologist (died 1861)
  • April 29 – George Don, Scottish botanist (died 1856)
  • May 2 – Abraham Gesner, Canadian inventor of kerosene (died 1864)
  • May 30 – Karl Friedrich Naumann, German geologist and mineralogist (died 1873)
  • July 14 – James Scott Bowerbank, British naturalist, geologist and paleontologist (died 1877)
  • July 26 – William Hutton, British geologist and paleontologist (died 1860)
  • August 23 – Adhémar Jean Claude Barré de Saint-Venant, French mechanician and mathematician (died 1886)
  • August 31 – James Ferguson, Scottish-born American astronomer (died 1867)
  • September 1 – Augustin-Pierre Dubrunfaut, French chemist (died 1881)
  • September 10 – Carl Gustaf Mosander, Swedish chemist (died 1858)
  • September 17 – Heinrich Kuhl, German zoologist (died 1821)
  • October 4 – Félix Savary, French astronomer (died 1841)
  • October 5 – John Gardner Wilkinson, British egyptologist (died 1875)
  • November 14 – Charles Lyell, Scottish geologist (died 1875)
  • November 20 - Mary Buckland, British paleontologist and marine biologist (died 1857)
  • December 3
  • Margaretta Morris, American entomologist (died 1867)
  • Andrew Smith, Scottish military surgeon, explorer, ethnologist and zoologist (died 1872)
  • December 17 – Joseph Henry, American scientist (died 1878)
  • December 23 – Adrien-Henri de Jussieu, French botanist (died 1853)

Deaths

  • March 16 – Cristina Roccati, Italian scholar in physics (born 1732)
  • March 26 – James Hutton, Scottish geologist (born 1726)
  • June 13 – Samuel-Auguste Tissot, Swiss physician (born 1728)
  • August 29 – Joseph Wright, English painter of scientific subjects (born 1734)
  • date unknown – Wang Zhenyi, Chinese Qing dynasty female astronomer and poet (born 1768)

References