<!-- "none" is preferred when the title is sufficiently descriptive; see WP:SDNONE -->

The year 1989 in science and technology involved many significant events, some listed below.

Astronomy

  • August – Asteroid 4769 Castalia is the first asteroid directly imaged, by radar from Arecibo.
  • August 25 – The Voyager 2 spacecraft makes its closest approach to Neptune, providing definitive proof of the planet's rings.
  • September 5 – Pluto–Charon barycentre comes to perihelion.
  • November 18 – Cosmic Background Explorer launched, "the starting point for cosmology as a precision science".
  • Asteroid 5128 Wakabayashi is discovered by Masahiro Koishikawa.
  • 4292 Aoba is discovered.
  • 4871 Riverside is discovered.
  • 6089 Izumi is discovered.
  • 6190 Rennes is discovered
  • 8084 Dallas is discovered.

Biology

  • Discovery of the cystic fibrosis trans-membrane conductance regulator gene.
  • The New Zealand Department of Conservation begins to implement a Kākāpō Recovery Plan.

Computer science

  • March 12 – Tim Berners-Lee submits a memorandum, titled "Information Management: A Proposal", to the management at CERN for a system that would eventually become the World Wide Web.
  • June 8 – GNU Bash is released.
  • July 26 – A federal grand jury indicts Cornell University student Robert Tappan Morris, Jr. for releasing a computer virus, making him the first person to be prosecuted under the 1986 Computer Fraud and Abuse Act in the United States.

Environment

  • The global concentration of carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere reaches 350 ppm (parts per million) by volume.

Physics

  • January – Supplee's paradox is published.
  • March 23 – Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann announce cold fusion at the University of Utah.

Physiology and medicine

  • The Oxford Database of Perinatal Trials begins publishing online.
  • The hepatitis C virus (HCV) is first identified by Michael Houghton and his team.

Technology

  • July 17 – The Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit "Stealth Bomber" aircraft, developed for the United States Air Force, first flies.
  • Isamu Akasaki produces the first Gallium nitride p-n junction blue/UV light-emitting diode.

Awards

  • Nobel Prizes
  • Physics – Norman F. Ramsey, Hans G. Dehmelt, Wolfgang Paul
  • Chemistry – Sidney Altman, Thomas R. Cech
  • Medicine – J. Michael Bishop, Harold E. Varmus
  • Turing Award – William (Velvel) Kahan

Births

  • May 9 – Katie Bouman, American computer imaging scientist

Deaths

  • February 27 – Konrad Lorenz (born 1903), Austrian zoologist.
  • March 18 – Sir Harold Jeffreys (born 1891), English mathematician.
  • April 24 – Horace Hodes (born 1907), American medical researcher.
  • August 10 – Isabella Forshall (born 1900), English pediatric surgeon.
  • August 12 – William Shockley (born 1910), American physicist.
  • August 20 – George Adamson (born 1906), British wildlife conservationist.
  • August 29 – Sir Peter Scott (born 1909), English wildlife conservationist.
  • October 11 – M. King Hubbert (born 1903), American geophysicist.
  • October 28 – Louise Hay (born 1935), French-born American mathematician; breast cancer.
  • December 14 – Andrei Sakharov (born 1921), Soviet Russian nuclear physicist and political dissident.

References