Author Topic: ~ Famous Scientists ~  (Read 58354 times)

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #225 on: June 26, 2014, 05:52:21 PM »
Sven Wingqvist



Sven Wingquist, a Swedish inventor, engineer and industrialist, is responsible for perfecting the system used for one of the most basic things that we still use today – the spherical ball bearing. With different industries and processes relying on this simple invention, he has made his mark in history.

Life and Education

Sven Gustaf Wingquist was born in the municipality of Kumla, which was found south of Orebro in Sweden in 1876. His father, Sven Daniel Wingquist, was Hallsberg’s railway station inspector. His mother was Anna Lundberg.

He attended Orebro Technical Elementary School until he graduated in 1894 and went on to study at the John Lennings Textile College found in Norrkoping. Here, he widened his knowledge on the technical aspects of the textile industry. Because Sven dreamed of creating more efficient processes in industrial production, Sven left for the US in 1896.

He eventually married a girl named Kristina Hult in 1919 while enjoying the continuous growth of SKF. Despite the huge success that Sven Wingquist achieved, he remained humble and lived simply. He preferred staying in the background and gave very few interviews.

Sven Wingquist died in 1953, leaving behind a legacy that still continues to benefit the world until today.

His Greatest Invention

In 1899, Sven became an operating engineer at a weavery in a district called Gamlestadens in Goteberg, Sweden. They continuously experienced problems because the factory was built on clay soil. Because the ground was unstable, the building housing their main operations shifted from time to time. This caused their drive shafts to incur damages, and their machines overheated. Since they wanted to avoid this fire hazard, they found a way to solve the problem. This solution however also meant ordering ball bearings that came all the way from Germany which caused deliveries to take several months. Even worse, the ball bearings proved to be of poor quality which means that their effort to avoid further damages would ultimately be useless. The ball bearings broke down at an alarming rate, causing even more damage to the drive shafts.

This was when Sven felt that he needed to think of a solution to the problem himself. He studied different concepts used on the development of ball bearings from all over Europe. He especially took great interest in a report from Professor Richard Stribeck in 1902. Stribeck was then affiliated with the Institute of Technology in Dresden, Germany where he tried comparing the properties of ball bearings and plain bearings using scientific methods. This gave Wingquist the idea that there was a lot of room for innovations in this industry. He set up a small workshop inside the factory where he worked and conducted several tests and came up with a lot of different designs.

In 1906, he came up with a simple design that was made up of two rows of balls and two rings, the single-row, self-aligning ball bearing. The outer ring’s interior was spherical in shape which allowed freedom of movement for the inner ring. With the entire load equally divided between the two balls, friction was controlled and further damage to the drive shafts was finally avoided.

Building Svenska Kullagerfabriken (S.K.F.)

Wingquist’s invention caught the eyes of a number of investors. Upon closing a few deals, Svenska Kullagerfabriken, more popularly known now as SKF, was founded in 1907. Wingquist personally went around the entire country, demonstrating how his ball bearings worked and finding new customers who can benefit from his invention. In a matter of months, he had talked to over a hundred companies in different areas and never failed to impress his audiences. He received order after order for his invention. In the same year, he got a Swedish patent for his design in eleven countries including his own.

Business boomed to unimaginable heights bringing Wingquist a lot of fame and fortune. In 1908 alone, over SEK 114,000 worth of products were ordered, which was quite a fortune at that time. After eight years, SKF grew to become a global company, with factories built in 27 countries around the world. By 1920, SKF has been receiving orders for SEK 23 million worth of ball bearings.

Sven Wingquist held the position of Chief Operating Officer until 1919. He became Chairman of the Board after this.

Today, SKF has truly become a global giant. With 106 years of experience in the business, they now employ over 46,700 employees in 140 sites and 16 technical centers across 32 countries around the world. Their products include actuation systems, bearings units and housings, condition monitoring systems, coupling systems, lubrication solutions, linear motion, magnetic systems, maintenance products, power transmissions, seals, test and measurement equipment, and vehicle aftermarket. They also offer different services like asset management, business consulting, customer training, engineering consultancy, logistics, mechanical maintenance, remanufacturing and maintenance, remote monitoring and diagnosis, and service contracts. SKF provides solutions across different industries including aerospace, agriculture, construction, material handling, mining and mineral processing, oil and gas, racing, and a lot more.

SKF continues to grow and evolve, adapting to the changes across different industries and applying newly established technologies. New factories are continuously being built and bought as the number of products and services that they offer across the different industries they cater to grows as well.

Other Achievements

Sven Wingquist did not only apply his skills in his own company, but in other companies as well. In fact, he also became the CEO of Bofors, a weapons manufacturer found in Karlskoga.

Two of Wingquist’s young employees, Gustaf Larson and Assar Gabrielsson, eventually expressed their interest in building a Swedish car company. Because Wingquist was also a car enthusiast he supported their endeavor and gave them financial support through SKF. When it was time to think of a name for the car company, the two were trying to decide between calling it “GL” or “Larson”. Sven Wingquist thought that it would be more interesting to name the company something else and suggested a Latin word that literally meant “I roll.” This word was Volvo.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #226 on: July 10, 2014, 01:25:01 PM »
Thabit ibn Qurra



Al-Sabi Thabit ibn Qurra al-Harrani (836 –901) was a an astronomer and mathematician born in present day Turkey, best known for translating classic Greek works on astronomy, and discovered an equation for determining the amicable numbers. He was a Mandean physician, who was known as Thebit in Latin.

Early Life:

Thabit was a member of the Sabian religious sect. His heritage was sharp in traditions of Hellenistic culture and pagan veneration of the stars. This background, and in particular his knowledge of Greek and Arabic, made him an attractive prospect for enclosure in one particular community of scholars, the Banu Musa and their circle in Baghdad. Thabit seems to have been asked to join this circle by a family member, the mathematician Muhammad ibn Musa ibn Shakir, who recognized his talents and potential.

Thabit subsequently came to fame after traveling to Baghdad when he was invited by Muhammad bin Musa bin Shakir, one of the Banu Musa brothers. He worked in Baghdad and he occupied himself with mathematics, astronomy, mechanics, medicine and philosophy.

Contributions and Achievements:

Thabit is credited with dozens of treatises, covering a wide range of fields and topics. While some were written in his native Syriac, most were composed in Arabic. Thabit was trilingual, a skill that enabled him to play a key role in the translation movement of 9th century Baghdad. He translated works from both Syriac and Greek into Arabic, creating Arabic versions of important Hellenistic and Greek writings. Several of Thabit’s Arabic translations are the only extant versions of important ancient works.

The medieval astronomical theory of the trepidation of the equinoxes is often attributed to Thabit. He developed a theory about the trepidation and oscillation of the equinoctial points, of which many scholars debated in the Middle Ages.

According to Copernicus Thabit determined the length of the sidereal year as 365 days, 6 hours, 9 minutes and 12 seconds (an error of 2 seconds). Copernicus based his claim on the Latin text attributed to Thabit. Thabit published his observations of the Sun. In the fields of mechanics and physics he may be recognized as the founder of statics. He observed conditions of equilibrium of bodies, beams and levers. Thabit also wrote on philosophical and cosmological topics, questioning some of the fundamentals of the Aristotelian cosmos.

He rejected Aristotle’s concept of the essence as immobile, a position Rosenfeld and Gregorian suggest is in keeping with his anti Aristotelian stance of allowing the use of motion in mathematics. Thabit also wrote important treatises related to Archimedean problems in statics and mechanics. Besides all these contributions he also founded a school of translation and supervised the translation of a further large number of books from Greek to Arabic.

Among Thabit’s writings a large number have survived, while several are not present. Most of the books are on mathematics, followed by astronomy and medicine. The books have been written in Arabic but some are in Syriac. In the Middle Ages, some of his books were translated into Latin by Gherard of Cremona. In recent centuries, a number of his books have been translated into European languages and published. Thabit’s efforts provided a foundation for continuing work in the investigation and reformation of Ptolemaic astronomy. His life is illustrative of the fact that individuals from a wide range of backgrounds and religions contributed to the flourishing of sciences like astronomy in Islamic culture.

Death:

Thabit died in Baghdad. Thabit and his grandson Ibrahim ibn Sinan studied the curves which are needed for making of sundials that is commendable and is a great source of inspiration for the learners.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #227 on: July 10, 2014, 01:27:18 PM »
Theodor Schwann



Theodor Schwann was a German physiologist who is widely credited as the founder of modern histology. He played a vital role in the development of cell theory and defined the cell as the fundamental unit of animal structure.

Early Life and Education:

Theodor Schwann was born in Neuss, Germany in 1810. His father was a goldsmith. Schwann loved tinkering with mechanical devices as a child. He studied medicine at the universities of Bonn, Würzburg, and Berlin.

Contributions and Achievements:

Schwann completed his graduation in 1834 and accepted a job at a Berlin anatomy museum. He discovered the digestive enzyme pepsin during this time. He also researched fermentation and muscle movement and made important discoveries. He was appointed a professor of anatomy at the University of Leuven, Belgium in 1838. Schwann discovered the organic nature of yeast and also coined the term “metabolism”.

Schwann implemented Matthias Schleiden’s cell theory to animals in 1839, and demonstrated that every mature animal tissue is composed of embryonic cells. He later moved to the University of Liège, Belgium in 1848, where he taught physiology and anatomy.

Later Life and Death:

In his later life, Theodor Schwann had developed a passion in theological issues. Schwann, however, continued to study cells until his death in 1882. He was 72 years old when he died.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #228 on: July 10, 2014, 01:29:37 PM »
Theodosius Dobzhansky



Widely regarded as the founder of evolutionary genetics, Theodosius Dobzhansky was an eminent Ukrainian-American geneticist and evolutionist. He played a vital role in the development of evolutionary theory and genetics.

Early Life and Education:

Born in Nemirov, Russian Empire in 1900, Theodosius Dobzhansky was the son of a high school mathematics teacher. He belonged to a family of Russian Orthodox priests. During his childhood, Dobzhansky had developed a passion of collecting insects, and was an ardent fan of outdoor activities. In his high-school days, he decided to become a biologist. After graduating in biology from the University of Kiev in 1921, Dobzhansky accepted a position at the Polytechnic Institute of Kiev on the faculty of agriculture.

Contributions and Achievements:

During his stay as a professor and researcher, Theodosius Dobzhansky started devoting his efforts to the emerging field of genetics. He studied many newer areas of genetics, starting extensive research on the fruit-fly (Drosophila melanogaster). Many contemporary geneticists followed his work, such as Russian entomologist Yuri Filipchenko, who was Dobzhansky’s fellow professor at Leningrad University until 1927. He also later analyzed the genetics of horses and cattle.

Dobzhansky followed zoologist Thomas Hunt Morgan to the California Institute of Technology in 1928, working as assistant professor in genetics. A few years later, in 1933, he made an important breakthrough when Dobzhansky changed his model organism to Drosophila pseudoobscura. The results corroborated his worked “Genetics and the Origin of Species”. Published in 1937, it turned out to be the most important book on evolutionary biology of the 20th century. A combination of Darwinian selection and modern genetics, it became a catalyst for future researches in evolution.

Dobzhansky joined the Columbia University in 1940, making an energetic group of genetics researchers around him. He moved to Rockefeller University in 1962, where he remained until his retirement in 1970. Dobzhansky revolutionized the application of genetics and evolution to the understanding of human beings. He also wrote about anthropological and philosophical themes, for instance his influential 1962 work, “Mankind Evolving”, that changed the face of modern genetics and evolutionary theory.

Later Life and Death:

Theodosius Dobzhansky retired from Rockefeller University in 1970, and announced to join the University of California at Davis as a supervisor. He died five years later, in 1975, following a long battle with leukemia. He was 75 years old.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #229 on: July 10, 2014, 01:32:46 PM »
Thomas Alva Edison



Thomas Alva Edison is one of the greatest American inventors who held countless patents, majority of them related to electricity and power. While two of his most famous inventions are the incandescent lamp and the phonograph, arguably the most significant invention of Edison is considered to be organized research.

Early Life:

Edison was born on February 11, 1847 in the historic city of Milan (Ohio). His father was a versatile person and a man-of-all-work, while his mother was a teacher. Edison was mostly homeschooled by his mother. Edison became a salesman of fruit, paper and other goods on the Grand Trunk Railroad at a tender age of 12. With the help of his tiny handpress in a trash car, he wrote and published the Grand Trunk Herald in 1862, which was sent to 400 railroad employees. The same year Edison worked as a telegraph operator, trained by the father of a kid whose life he had saved. Edison was a tramp telegrapher, as he was exempted from military service due to his deafness. He was recruited in 1868 by Western Union Telegraph Company in Boston.

Early Conceptions:

Perhaps the first invention of Edison was a telegraph repeater in 1864 which worked automatically, while his earliest patent was registered for an electric vote recorder. He acquired partnership in a New York electrical company in 1869, where he honed the stock ticker and sold it. With all his money, Edison paid for his own factory in Newark, N.J., where he hired technicians to help him with the inventions. His dream was to create an “invention factory.” Almost 80 “earnest men,” including physicists, mathematicians and chemists, were among his collaborators. “Invention to order” made him good money at this place.

From 1870 to 1875 Edison devised many telegraphic advances including receivers, transmitters, the duplex, tape and automatic printers. He also collaborated in 1871 with Christopher Sholes, also known as “father of the typewriter,” to ameliorate the typing machine. Edison claimed to have made twelve typewriters at Newark in 1870. As a result, the Remington Company purchased his interests.

Edison’s carbon telegraph transmitter for Western Union brought a breakthrough for the creation of the Bell telephone. The money he got from Western Union for the transmitter was spent to establish a factory in Menlo Park, N.J. One more time, he used scientific talent to register over 300 patents in only 6 years. His electric pen (1877) developed stencils to produce copies.

Other Inventions and Contributions:

Probably his most impressive invention, the phonograph, was patented in 1877. By 1890 Edison had about 80 patents under his name, and that was pretty much the reason The Victor Company came into being.

To explore incandescence, Edison and his fellows, among them J. P. Morgan, developed the Edison Electric Light Company in 1878. Years later, the company became the General Electric Company. Edison invented the first practical incandescent lamp in 1879. With months of hard work researching metal filaments, Edison and his staff analyzed 6,000 organic fibers around the world and determined that the Japanese bamboo was ideal for mass production. Large scale production of these cheap lamps turned out to be profitable, hence the first fluorescent lamp was patented in 1896.

Edison made an amazing discovery in pure science, termed as the Edison Effect. He discovered in 1883 that electrons flowed from incandescent filaments. The lamp could function as a valve using a metal-plate insert, while taking only negative electricity. A method to transmit telegraphic “aerial” signals over short distances was patented by Edison in 1885. The “wireless” patent was later sold to Guglielmo Marconi.

The huge West Orange, N.J., factory was supervised from 1887 to 1931 by Edison. This was probably the world’s most cutting-edge research laboratory, and a forerunner to modern research and development laboratories, with experts systematically investigating and researching for the solution of problems.

The Edison battery, made perfect in 1910, used an alkaline electrolyte, and proved to be a superb storage device. The copper oxide battery, strikingly similar to modern dry cells, was modified in 1902.

The kinetograph, his motion picture camera, was able to photograph action on 50-foot strips of film, and produced about sixteen images per foot. A young assistant of Edison built a small laboratory in 1893 called the “Black Maria,” which was substantial in making the first Edison movies. The kinetoscope projector of 1893 finally displayed the films. The earliest commercial movie theater, a peepshow, was established in New York in 1884. After developing and modifying the projector of Thomas Armat in 1895, Edison commercialized it as the “Vitascope”.

The Edison Company created over 1,700 movies. Edison set the benchmark for talking pictures in 1904 by synchronizing movies with the phonograph. His cinemaphone adjusted the film speed to phonograph speed. The kinetophone projected talking pictures in 1913. The phonograph, behind the screen, was synchronized by pulleys and ropes with the projector. Edison brought forth many “talkies.”

The universal motor, which utilized alternating or direct current, appeared in 1907. The electric safety lantern, patented in 1914, significantly reduced casualties among miners. The same year Edison devised the telescribe, which unified characteristics of the telephone and dictating phonograph.

Services for the Government:

Edison presided the U.S. Navy Consulting Board throughout World War I and made 45 more inventions. These inventions included substitutes for antecedently imported chemicals (such as carbolic acid), a ship-telephone system, an underwater searchlight, defensive instruments against U-boats, among others. Later on, Edison launched the Naval Research Laboratory, the eminent American institution for research involving organized weapons.

Death:

This multi-genius died on Oct. 18, 1931 in West Orange, N.J. The laboratory buildings and equipment affiliated with Edison were upheld in Greenfield Village, Detroit, Michigan by Henry Ford, a friend and admirer.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #230 on: July 10, 2014, 01:35:04 PM »
Thomas Burnet



Thomas Burnet was an English divine theologian and a notable writer on speculative cosmogony or the scientific theory of how the universe was created. Burnet was also the royal chaplain to the king of England that time, William III and a cabinet officer as well. His famous work was the Telluris Theoria Sacra and was translated to Sacred Theory of the Earth. Many would say that his work was considered to be the most popular of all geologic works in the seventeenth century. His books were widely criticized by many but he defended himself with his own views. With his works, he was able to attract solid supporters and as well as strong opponents. In his other book, the Archaeologiae Philosophicae sive Doctrina Antiqua de Rerum Originibus or The Ancient Doctrine Concerning the Origin of Things, his views were strongly opposed that he had to resign his post in the court. Despite the drawbacks in his writings, Thomas Burnet was one of the first few people to view the material world basing on historical development.

Personal Life and Education

Born English, Thomas Burnet was born in 1635 at Croft in Yorkshire, England. He went to Northallerton to study grammar under whom he has amazed and attracted with his views, Thomas Smelt. After getting educated, he transferred to Clare Hall, Cambridge about the year 1651. He became the student of John Tilotson. But in 1654, Burnet decided to follow the Clare Master, Ralph Cudworth moving to Christ’s College in Cambridge. After three years, he became fellow of Christ’s, was M.A. the following year and then in the year 1667, he became a senior university proctor.

Burnet remained fellow of Christ’s until the year 1678, though he was not all the time in his residence. During his stay in Cambridge, he worked intimately with the Cambridge Platonists, making a special mention on Henry More and Cudworth. In the year 1671, Burnet went out of the country as governor and then made a second tour later on in Europe.

Early Career

Thomas Burnet grabbed employment by travelling with Charles Paulet’s son, Lord Wiltshire and through James Butler, who was the 1st Duke of Ormonde. Burnet was then able to secure a position through the Duke of Ormonde’s influence, where one of the governors appointed him the master of the Charterhouse School in 1685 where he then obtained the D.D. degree.

Being the master, Burnet made a strong and righteous stand opposing the illegal attempts to let Andrew Popham become admitted as a pensioner of the Charterhouse. In the same way, he strongly opposed the order of James II on the 26th of December, 1686 to the governors providing with the decrees for that said occasion.

It was during his travels that he was able to formulate his views and theories about the Earth. It was the books he published that made him become notable and at the same time, controversial. He was able to publish the famous works on the Sacred Theory of the Earth or his Telluris Theoria Sacra, Archaeologiae Philosophicae or the Ancient Doctrine Concerning the Origin of Things, and De Statu Mortuorum et Resurgentium or On the State of the Dead and the Resurrection, which was only published after his death.

Contributions to Science

In 1681 within the boundaries of London, Burnished published his popular work Telluris Theoria Sacra or Sacred Theory of the Earth. The book, which contained a whimsical theory of the structure of the Earth, had attracted so much attention to the readers which in turn had encouraged an issue of the book’s translation in English that was then printed in the form of folio between the years 1684 to 1689.

The book was an exploratory cosmogony, in which he proposed a hollow earth filled with mostly water until the Flood on the time of Noah, at that time oceans and mountains appeared. Burnet calculated the volume of water on the surface of the Earth, which then he stated that the amount of water was not sufficient to conclude that the Flood. To some extent, Burnet was somehow influenced by Rene Descartes who wrote the Principia philosophiae tackling the earth’s creation in the year 1644. Roger North, a lawyer, criticized the grounds of Burnet’s work. The sacrilegious views of Isaac La Peyrere contained the idea of the Flood being not universal; on the other hand, the theory of Burnet was partly intended to respond on that idea regarding that point.

Burnet’s system showed the features of his novels, including the four classical elements, which were very conventional – an originally ovoid Earth, the Paradise that was always present in the spring season before the Flood, and the rivers that flow from the Equator poles. In 1685, a criticism on his work was published by Herbert Croft, which accused Burnet of not following the Book of Genesis; instead, he followed the Second Epistle of Peter. Still, he defended his views against the critics.

Despite the criticisms, Isaac Newton remained attracted on Burnet’s approach on theological views to his connection on geological processes. For this, Newton sent Burnet a letter proposing the possibility on the creation of the Earth. He suggested that when God made the Earth, the days seemed longer. However, the proposal of Newton was not considered by Burnet scientific enough to add up on his views on the creation of the Earth. He considered lengthening the span of days as already part of God’s intervention. Despite the clamor of science and theology, Burnet held tightly on his belief that God made the world along with its processes wholly and suitably from the very beginning.

The works of Thomas Burnet were controversial, yet remarkable to many. His works influenced a lot of people. Samuel Taylor Coleridge, an English poet and philosopher, was one of them. Burnet was cited at the start of the 1817 edition of his longest and major poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

Burnet’s influence even reached the moon. For that, the moon’s Dorsa Burnet ridge was named after him and his great works and contributions in Science.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #231 on: July 10, 2014, 01:37:08 PM »
Thomas Hunt Morgan



Thomas Hunt Morgan was an eminent American zoologist and geneticist. He is known for his legendary experimental analysis of the fruit fly, after which he formulated the chromosome theory of heredity. Morgan also demonstrated that genes are connected in a series on chromosomes, which carry hereditary traits, therefore kickstarting the modern field of genetics.

He won the 1933 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for his extraordinary achievements.

Early Life and Education:

Born in Lexington, Kentucky, on September 25, 1866 to a rich, influential southern family, Thomas Hunt Morgan earned his B.S. degree from the State College of Kentucky (now the University of Kentucky) in 1886, and his Ph.D. degree from the Johns Hopkins University in 1890. After his doctorate, Morgan joined the faculty of Bryn Mawr College for a while.

Contributions and Achievements:

Thomas Hunt Morgan was appointed a professor of experimental zoology at Columbia University in 1904. He established a large laboratory at this place that was later termed as the “Fly Room.” In collaboration with fellow biologist Lilian Morgan and several other assistants, Morgan studied and highlighted the two specific characteristics of the fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster). They were able to demonstrate the results of mating individual flies having these specific characteristics. The discovery is regarded as the earliest to extend Mendel’s genetics from the plants into the animals.

Morgan also extensively studied the field of experimental embryology. He knew the hypothetical connections between genetics and development, but was rather unwilling at the time to reveal those links explicitly.

Morgan won the 1924 Darwin Medal, the 1933 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine and the 1939 Copley Medal.

Later Life and Death:

Thomas Hunt Morgan continued to work in the laboratory until his death. He died in Pasadena, California, of a heart failure, on December 4, 1945. Morgan was 79 years old.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #232 on: July 10, 2014, 01:40:51 PM »
Thomas Kuhn



An American historian, physicist, and one of the most influential people being a philosopher of science, Thomas Kuhn became famous for his book published in 1962 called The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. This book became a highly influential work in academic as well as other circles because of his claims about scientific knowledge and its progress which undergoes what is called the paradigm shift. His work in that particular book has even made an impact to the study of the English language which made him an even more influential man of science.

Personal Life and Academic Background of Thomas Kuhn

On July 18, 1922, Thomas Kuhn was born in Cincinnati, Ohio to his mother Minette Stroock Kuhn, and his father who was an industrial engineer named Samuel L. Kuhn. His awareness for physics and mathematics began after he graduated from The Taft School in 1940. In 1943, he was already able to attain his B.S. Degree in Physics after attending Harvard University and he graduated summa cum laude. From the same university, he obtained both his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees for physics in the years 1946 and 1949.

According to him and as stated on the preface to The Structure of Scientific Revolutions’ second edition, the three years of academic freedom that he experienced as one of the Harvard Junior Fellows were key to his being able to switch from physics towards the history and philosophy of science.

He was married twice, and had three children with Kathryn Muhs who was his first wife. He later married Jehane Barton Burns or Jehane R. Kuhn. In 1994, he was diagnosed with lung cancer, and he died 2 years later in 1996.

Careers

After graduating from Harvard University, he spent his years there in doing research about radar during the war years. He was elected as a member of the Society of Fellows at Harvard, a prestigious society of the University. Up until 1956, Thomas Kuhn taught science classes of humanities undergraduates which were part of the curriculum for General Education in Science. This paved way to his being able to study more historical cases in detail. He then had a fascination for Aristotle’s works which made him understand more about philosophy while having his knowledge for science remain undistorted.

Because of that experience, he concentrated on the history of science. After some time, he was then appointed as the assistant professor for the history of science as well as general education. In this time of his career, his work was focused on the early history concerning thermodynamics as well as the 18th century theory on matter. His first book was published in 1957 when he turned his focus to the history of astronomy, and his book was called The Copernican Revolution.

In 1956, Kuhn moved to the University of California at Berkeley to take a teaching post for the history of science under the philosophy department. In 1961, he then became one of the full time professors there. It was his years in the University of California that developed his interest for the philosophy of science. A year later, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions was published.

The main idea behind this publication was that the development of science has a driving force which is what Kuhn called as paradigms. These paradigms supple the puzzles which scientists are to solve as well as provide the tools which are needed to solve the problem. Scientific crises arise when the paradigm loses its ability to solve puzzles which are particularly worrying, and these are called the anomalies.

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions is also referred to as the SSR and in his work, Kuhn argued that paradigms happen to be incommensurable—which means it is not possible for one to understand a paradigm by understanding another rival paradigm’s conceptual framework. His work had many critics, and especially about a paradigm’s being incommensurable, David Stove thought of this as irrational. According to him, if one cannot make comparisons between rival paradigms, how is one to know which one is better? Because of the interpretation, Kuhn denied that his work had any relativism behind it in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions’ third edition for clarification on his views and to avoid other misinterpretations.

Apart from being influential and controversial in science-related fields, SSR had an enormous impact on linguistic aspects as well. In Kuhn’s own words in the postscript of SSR’s second edition, he said that “the most novel and least understood aspect of this book.” Other terms coined with the rise of his book involved “normal science” which referred the daily work of scientists. “Scientific revolutions” referred to work which took place in different periods and encompassing several disciplines.

The work of Thomas Kuhn is truly influential in several fields including language, science, social science, and even made a presence in the debate about International Relations.

Honors and Awards

Because of his significant contribution and influence in several fields of study, Kuhn received several numerous honorary doctorates and he is credited as the foundational force who brought to life the post-Mertonian Sociology of Scientific Knowledge.

During his teaching career, notable positions he held included being the M. Taylor Pyne Professor of Philosophy and History of Science in Princeton University back in 1964. It was in 1979 when he became the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Laurance S. Rockefeller Professor of Philosophy. In 1954 Thomas Kuhn was named as a Guggenheim Fellow. The History of Science Society awarded him the George Sarton Medal in 1982.

Because of his legacy which brought to life awareness about the paradigm shift, the American Chemical Society awards the “Thomas Kuhn Paradigm Shift Award” to different speakers who are able to present new and original views which are not considered as part of the mainstream kind of scientific understanding. The winning candidate gets the award depending on how novel the viewpoint he or she present is. The potential impact of the said viewpoint and if it can be widely accepted is also taken into consideration. This is to honor the same legacy that the paradigm shift idea of Thomas Kuhn brought to the people of today.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #233 on: July 10, 2014, 01:43:09 PM »
Thomas Midgeley Jr.



Thomas Midgeley Jr. was a chemist and mechanical engineer who was also one of the most notable names in a group of chemists who developed TEL or tetraethyl lead as well as developed some of the very first chloroflourocarbons. TEL is an additive to gasoline which helped prevent the “knocking” of engines while the CFCs are some of the chemicals still used for cooling purposes. Throughout his life as a scientist, he received more than a hundred patents, but because some of his innovations are now deemed not eco-friendly, his name has been quite tarnished.

Early Life and Background

He hailed from Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania and was born on the 18th of May in 1889. His father was also an inventor and this was one of the reasons why he had been inspired to make his very own innovations. While growing up in Columbus, Ohio, he finished his degree in mechanical engineering from the Cornell University. Despite studying to be an engineer though, his claim to fame had come to him as a chemist instead.

Career

His degree in mechanical engineering wasn’t all lost because the most notable innovations he was known for still related to mechanical engineering to some extent. He worked for Charles F. Kettering at the Dayton Research Laboratories which was under General Motors. They were trying to solve how to avoid knocking in engines, or that continuous pinging or putting sound which was observed in internal-combustion engines.

Midgley was able to deduce that this engine knocking was caused by increased pressure as well as temperature within the cylinders of the engine. Being a mechanical engineer, he could have changed the design of the engine, but it could be said that he “thought out of the box” by solving the problem another way.

He found ways to alter a gasoline’s chemical makeup and this was where he added bromine from seawater and tetraethyl lead. His “no-knock” gasoline was invented in 1921, and naturally, drivers who were constantly experiencing this problem found this as an appealing solution to avoid engine knocking and potential permanent damage to their vehicles. However, there was one major problem from this product—it caused the death of at least 7 workers.

Their deaths had been caused by the lead found in the ethyl gasoline and it had been toxic. The deaths happened in the 1920s and in 1924, Midgely himself took an extended medical leave because of lead poisoning as well. About a year later, he wrote a paper about the hazards of lead poisoning and it was determined how lead additives to gasoline were highly toxic and were also pollutants which caused blood as well as brain disorders in children, some antisocial behavior, and also lowered IQ levels. Come year 1970, the ethyl compounds discovered by Midgely had been removed from gasoline and the negative effects of adding these compounds were widely recognized and ultimately avoided.

Before lead was removed from gasoline to come up with the “no-knock” formulation, the product was called “ethyl” and no mention of lead in its composition was ever mentioned. Automobile manufacturers as well as oil companies even promoted the TEL additive discovered by Midgely as a top additive for ethanol-blend or ethanol fuels. Before Midgely filed for a medical leave caused by lead poisoning, he even received the award for “Use of Anti-Knock Compounds in Motor Fuels” for his Nichols Medal. This award was the his first of many—sadly, this same award was for a product which was later on shunned because of its negative side effects on the environment as well as the health of the people exposed to it.

After his invention of the “no-knock” gasoline, his career continued and in 1928, he was transferred to work for Frigidaire which at that time had also been one of the subsidiaries of General Motors. During his time there, he was then tasked to find safer and more affordable refrigerant substitutes. However, all of those he discovered were either flammable, toxic, or both at the same time. Because of these limitations, he came up with dichlorodifluoromethane which is a mixture of mostly chlorine, carbon, and fluorine—this mixture is now known as the CFCs or chlorofrlourocarbons. The trademark given for this product was “Freon” and it is still being used for some refrigerators, air conditioners, and even insect repellents.

A few decades later, however, a number of studies showed how this same product has been causing the destruction of the ozone layer which in turn reduced the natural protection that humans have against the harmful sun rays. Also of note was that Freon leaks can cause higher death rates in an area caused by asphyxiation since its molecular structure has the ability to displace oxygen. During the year 1980, most products using Freon were banned. What is interesting is that before all of these negative effects were noted, Midgely even wrote one of his papers in 1939 which suggested how the ozone layer could possibly be manipulated with the aim to control climate.

Life After His Inventions

The American Chemical Society even gave Midgely their Priestly Medal which was their highest form of recognition. He also received the Willard Gibbs Award and was later on also elected as the chairman and president of the American Chemical Society.

Later in his life, he had polio which continued to progress and left him in the confines of his home. Even then, he was able to design a system of pulleys to allow him to move from one place to another without the need to be assisted by another person.

Like his several other inventions though, this ambulatory aid he made for himself also had its own dangers. On the second day of November 1944, he slipped and accidentally got himself entangled in the device’s ropes which in turn strangled him to death. He was 55 when this happened. He died thirty years before the negative effects of CFCs were noted along with the other negative effects of lead in gasoline which also caused atmospheric damage.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #234 on: July 10, 2014, 01:45:00 PM »
Thomas Newcomen



Thomas Newcomen was a prominent British engineer, best known for inventing the atmospheric steam engine, which was the the world’s oldest known steam engine for pumping water. The Newcomen engine largely influenced later designs such as James Watt’s engine.

Career:

Born in Dartmouth, Devon, England, Thomas Newcomen initially worked as an ironmonger at Dartmouth. Since flooding was a major problem in the area, Newcomen, with the help of a plumber named John Calley, extensively worked on a steam pump, which was found to be much efficient than Thomas Savery’s conventional crude pump.

In this design, the intensity of pressure was not restricted by the pressure of the steam. Newcomen devised the internal-condensing jet for producing a vacuum in the cylinder and an automatic valve gear.

The first operational Newcomen engine was built in 1712 near Dudley Castle, Staffordshire. It proved to be a very efficient and cost-effective tool for drainage of mines and raising water to power waterwheels.

Later Life and Death:

Thomas Newcomen died on August 5, 1729 in London, England. He was 65 years old.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #235 on: July 10, 2014, 01:48:12 PM »
Thomas Willis



A neuroanatomist and physician in the 17th century, Thomas Willis is known to be the Father of Neuroscience and is responsible for building the foundation which a lot of studies, research and discoveries relating to the brain and the nervous system stemmed from.

Early Life and Education

Thomas Willis was born in his parents’ farm on the 27th of January, 1621 in Great Bedwyn, Wiltshire, England. Both of his parents, Thomas and Rachel, were committed royalists. Thomas Willis was the eldest among three sons.

Willis initially attended the School of Edward Sylvester. On March 3, 1967, he got into the University of Oxford’s Christ Church College which he attended for over nine years. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1639, his Master of Arts degree in 1642, and his Bachelor of Medicine in 1646.

Both father and son served during the Civil War because of the family’s undying loyalty to King Charles I. His father did not survive. The King recognized young Thomas’s service, however, which is why he was granted his medical degree seven years earlier.

With his degree, he practiced medicine in a nearby town as he was not allowed to practice in Oxford because of his lack of experience. He went around local markets to offer his service. He also stayed in touch with other scientists and physicians and habitually discussed cases that they handled. His network included the architect and artist Sir Christopher Wren, physician, anatomist and physiologist Richard Lower, physicists Isaac Newton, Robert Boyle and Robert Hooke, and physician and philosopher John Locke.

On April 7, 1657, Thomas Willis married Mary Fell whose identity was surrounded by a lot of controversy. Giving birth to eight children all in all, it was said that only one or two of them survived. Within the same period, both of Thomas’ siblings also died at a young age. Mary Fell Willis died in 1666. All the deaths in his family did not discourage Thomas Willis though, and he continued doing research and practicing medicine.

Notable Contributions

Before Thomas Willis came into the picture, the concept of neuroanatomy was very vague and details surrounding it were extremely limited. They were based mostly from the knowledge that Berengario, Da Vinci and Vesalius shared, three scientists who were greatly influenced by Galen. Galen believed that the brain’s primary purpose was to purify spirits that were, at that time, blamed for a lot of human diseases. The spirits he believed in were known to be phantom-like and were said to be capable of making their own decisions. They were especially seen as responsible for a lot of mental disorders such as insanity and depression. At that time, the brains that these scientists studied were of poor quality, having no effective means of preserving the organ just yet.

Willis respected those who came before him, although he also acknowledged the inaccuracy of their work. He started working on anatomy and formulating his own hypotheses, a lot of which involved experimental and clinical observations. This time around, a preservation method known as “chiriguia infusoria” had already been developed by Sir Christopher Wren and found to be effective. This method allowed Willis to study the brain in its normal form as opposed to the disintegrated form that his predecessors were used to analyzing.

December 14, 1650 proved to be fateful for Thomas Willis. Anne Green was a 22-year old prisoner of the state. She was convicted for infanticide, the victim of which was her own newborn. After being hanged in Oxford’s Cattle Yard, her body was donated for scientific study to Oxford. The corpse was delivered to Willis’ colleague, William Petty. When the coffin was opened however, Green started gagging. Willis and Petty worked together in trying to revive her, and were successful after trying a few techniques that were less than traditional. This marked Willis’ career as a physician.

Thomas Willis had six books published, one of which was only published after his death. What made its mark in medical history was Cerebri Anatome, where Willis first used the term “neurologie”. In this book, he showed gratitude to both Richard Lower and Christopher Wren for assisting him during dissections and for contributing illustrations.

The Cerebri Anatome was the main reason why the arterial circle found at the base of the human brain is now called the Circle of Willis. Though he was not the first one who discovered and described it, he was the only one who was able to discuss it in great detail, describing each part and vascular pattern in depth. He was also responsible for naming a lot of other parts of the brain and the nervous system. Some terms that he coined aside from neurologie were optic thalamus, vagus nerve, corpus striatum, anterior comissure and internal capsule, among others.

Other Achievements

Thomas Willis was chosen as Oxford’s Sedleian Professor for Natural Philosophy in 1660 after an endorsement from Gilbert Sheldon, a strong supporter of his. He then devoted his career to neuroanatomy under the motivation of correcting the flawed studies that his predecessors conducted.

Thomas Willis came across several other brilliant medical and scientific minds during his time. Willis and these notable people were responsible for forming the prestigious Royal Society. He was also seen as responsible for major contributions not only in neurology but to other medical branches like endocrinology, cardiology and gastroenterology as well. He was also acknowledged by John Locke in one of his acclaimed pieces in philosophy because of his contributions to his field. Locke was one of Willis’ loyal followers and would often attend lectures conducted by Willis.

Willis spent the last nine years of his life in London as requested by the Archbishop of Canterbury. Here, he charged his wealthy patients big amounts to pay for his service while he treated the poor for free.

Thomas Willis died of pleurisy in London in December 11, 1675 and was buried at Westminster Abbey where his bones lie to this day. His discoveries formed the foundations of neurology and the medical field as a whole.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #236 on: July 14, 2014, 05:36:43 PM »
Tim Noakes



When people speak of great scientists they always tend to focus on the ones who worked with chemicals or broke the laws of physics. It is always on fields that seem to be extremely scientific. But what about people who work in the field of sports science? What about great men and women of science that challenged the way people thought about food and exercise? What about men like Tim Noakes? This sports scientist from Cape Town in South Africa has been redefining beliefs for years and has made numerous advances in the field of sports science and pushes the limits of human performance in different sporting fields. Check out what he has done and you will see why he deserves to be honored.

Get to Know Timothy David Noakes

Timothy Noakes was born in 1949 in Harare, Zimbabwe but moved to South Africa where he became an exercise and sports science professor. This was the position he took at the University of Cape Town in South Africa. What makes him so remarkable is that he doesn’t just preach but he practices as well. To date, he has participated in over 70 ultra-marathons and marathons combined. He has also authored some books, one of which is entitled Lore or Running which became a best seller and a holy grail of sorts to runners.

Early Life

As mentioned, Tim Noakes entered the world in Africa at Harare which is located in Zimbabwe although his family made the move to Cape Town in South Africa when he was just five. Like many South Africans he was crazy about cricket. This was probably what paved the way for a career in sports science. He attended the Monterey Preparatory School that was located right in Constantia Cape Town. He went to attend Diocesan College afterwards. This was where he earned his degrees. The first was his MBChB in 1974, then came his MD in 1981. He got his DSC (Med) in 2002.

Tim Noakes: Educator, Researcher, and Author

A year before he got his MD, Noakes was given a directive to start the course in sports science in the school at the University of Cape Town. With that successful venture he then became the head of the Bioenergetics Exercise Research Unit that was funded by the Medical Research Council. Later on, this was turned into the MRC/UCT Research Unit for Exercise Science and Sports Medicine.

When the early 90’s rolled in, Tim Noakes and former South African rugby player Morne du Plessis founded the Sports Science Institute of South Africa. Together with his unit, they managed to produce over 370 articles in sports science and fitness since the year 1996. As it happens, he is the leading researcher on a condition that is known as exercise-related hyponatremia (also known as EAH to stand for exercise-associated hyponatremia). For the very first time he saw signs of the condition when watching a female runner compete during the Comrades Marathon back in 1984. This was a condition that people who run marathons often suffer after filling up on too much water to supposedly combat dehydration. He published the results of his findings a year after in the Medicine and Science and sports and Exercise journal. Tim Noakes also hosted the very first international consensus in EAH back in May of 2005 in Cape Town.

He is also quite well known for elaborating and renewing the idea proposed by Archibald Hill (Nobel Prize Winner for Physiology or Medicine in 1922). The idea was of a central governor responsible for regulating exercise so the body is adequately protected from homeostasis. Homeostasis is the ability of the body to maintain a constant internal environment amidst changes in the environment.

Also in 2005, he went on to undertake a number of ground-breaking experiments conducted in the Antarctic and Artic with the participation of Lewis Gordon Pugh (British-born South African swimmer). They conducted the research to better understand the capabilities of the human body when under extreme cold. During the course of their research he found out that Pugh actually had the power to increase his body’s core temperature before he entered the water to better prepare for the cold. He is the man responsible for the term “thermo-genesis” in description of the ability. When Pugh went on to undergo a 1-km swim in the geographic North Pole back in 2007, Noakes was there to serve as the expedition doctor.

Writings

With all the research that he published it was only a matter of time before we started writing books. He went on to write several books, one of which is the Lore of Running – a book that is mainly used by runners to enjoy, understand, and improve their running performance. He also published a book entitled Waterlogged where he takes people on a very informative journey into the world of hydration for athletes. This is the same book where he states that drinking too much water after a marathon can have bad effects on the body and recovery of the athlete. Noakes worked with a nutritionist and other chef-athletes for his next work entitled The Real Meal Revolution where they walked and ran the difficult path through different challenges that had to do with nutritional science and experimenting on themselves. This book has some ground-breaking revelations and stances but it also has amazing and mouth-watering recipes backed by scientific study.

Awards

Tim Noakes is quite well-known for taking a challenging stance when it comes to old and common paradigms of exercise physiology. The American College of Sports Medicine honored him when he went over to present the J.B. Wolfe Memorial lecture in the year 1996. A lot of the work he has completed over the last decade supported his model of the brain being the central governor that dictated how much, how long, how strong, and how fast the body could perform. Truly, he is a gem in the world of sports science, and hopefully he will have more ground-breaking revelations to share about the human body and exercise physiology in years to come.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #237 on: July 14, 2014, 05:40:40 PM »
Timothy John Berners-Lee



For folks who thank the heavens every day for the invention of the internet, you should also start thanking the heavens for the man that invented the Internet (or the World Wide Web). The man who is responsible happens to be a British scientist Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee, FRSA, OM, FREng, KBE, DFBCS. Online, he goes by the name “TimBL.” This person had a major hand in developing the WWW and you will learn more about him now.

Who is TimBL?

As mentioned earlier, Tim Berners-Lee is a scientist from Britain that helped bring about the WWW. Berners-Lee submitted a proposal back in March 1989 and it was about a system for information management. He was also the first man to ever successfully communicate between an HTTP server and client with the use of the internet around November of that same year.

The W3C is directed by Berners-Lee. This W3C oversees the continued development of the WWW. He is also one of the directors of the WSRI and one of the members of the MIT Center for Collective Intelligence advisory board. He also founded the World Wide Web Foundation and is an esteemed senior researcher and holder of Founders Chair which is located at the CSAIL.

In the year 2004, TimBL was granted knighthood by the Queen of England to honor his outstanding work on the development of the Internet. In April of 2009, the US National Academy of Sciences elected him as a foreign associate. He was also given the honor and title of “Inventor of the World Wide Web” back in 2012 when they were holding the opening ceremonies of the 2012 Olympics. He was there to accept it because he was there using a NeXT Computer (a rather old computer model) right inside the stadium. He even tweeted “this is for everyone” and it was spelled out on LCD lights so that all the attendees could see.

The Early Life of Tim Berners-Lee

Tim Berners-Lee entered the world in England in Southwest London back in June 8, 1955. His parents were named Mary Lee Woods and Conway Berners-Lee; he had three siblings. The Berners-Lee couple worked with the very first ever commercial computer which was the FerrantiMark1 so you could say that computers were his legacy.

He went to the Sheen Mount Primary school then proceeded to Emanuel School in south west London from 1969 to 73. As a kid, he was a very keen train-spotter and learned all about electronics and tinkered with his model railway. He enrolled at the University of Oxford at The Queen’s College from 1973 to 76. He received a degree in physics (first class) when he finished his studies.

The Career of Tim Berners-Lee

After he graduated and got his degree, he was an engineer at a Plessey telecom located in Poole. However, in 1978 Tim Berners-Lee went to work for D.G. Nash in Dorset and this was where he had a hand in creating type-setting software to be used for printing machines.

From June to December in 1980, he worked for CERN as an independent contractor. While he was there, he made a proposal for a project based on what is known as hypertext. It was to be used to make sharing and updating of information shared by researchers easier and more convenient. He came up with a prototype system he called ENQUIRE to demonstrate how it would work.

After he left CERN in the late 1980, he went on to land a job at John Pooles Computer Systems LTD which was also located in England. He was the man in charge of the technical side of the company for a good 3 years. He worked on a project called “real time remote procedure call” and this gave him a taste of computer networking. For years after, he went back to CERN but as a fellow.

Five years after, in 1989, CERN was known as the largest internet node in the European continent and it was then that Tim saw his chance to meld HTTP with the Internet. He came up with his first proposal in March of 1989. A year after he was helped by Robert Caillau to come up with revisions his manager, Mike Sendall, would accept. He made use of similar ideas that were present in his ENQUIRE system to create the WWW. He even designed the very first ever web browser and his software also worked as an editor. The system was named Worldwide Web and it ran on using the NeXTSTEP OS. The very first web server was named CERN HTTPd. It comes as no surprise that the very first website ever was built at CERN and was published on August 6, 1991 and its address was info.cern.ch. It was both a web server and site. A NeXT computer located at CERN was used to run it. The site contained information about Berners-Lee’s project so visitors could glean information about HTTP and get other details about building webpages so they could make their own.

In 1994, Sir Berners-Lee founded the W3C at MIT and it was made up of different companies that were willing to work together to uphold the quality of the Web and also to make improvements as well. What is great about this Knight is that he made sure his ideas were available to anyone who wanted them and that they can be obtained without paying royalty fees.

His Current Work

Back in June 2009, British PM Gordon Brown made the announcement that TimBL would be working with the government so they could make data more accessible and open to people that needed it. In fact he and a professor named Nigel Shadbolt are two of the main figures behind the site data.gov.uk.

He is also one of the voices that are in favor of Net Neutrality and their main cry is that Internet Service Providers should be able to supply connectivity to users with no strings attached and that they should not monitor the activities of online behavior of their subscribers. Last October 2013, the Alliance for Affordable Internet was launched and he is the leader of public and private coalitions that include such companies like Facebook and Google.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #238 on: July 14, 2014, 05:43:47 PM »
Trofim Lysenko



Popular for having rejected the Mendelian genetics, Trofim Lysenko was an agronomist and biologist who favored Ivan Vladimirovich Michurin’s theories on hybridization instead. He was also known as someone who pursued “socialist genetics” which was the politicized science which made him Joseph Stalin’s favorite scientist. He supported these theories so much that he even coined the term Lysenkoism which was the pseudoscientific movement he had for hybridization. Lysenko was supported by Stalin himself concerning the experimental research efforts that Lysenko had especially for improving crop yields. Apart from being recognized as a scientist, some also refer to Lysenko as a hoaxer who was able to sway Stalin into believing what he said.

The Beginnings of Trofim Lysenko

Trofim Lysenko was born Trofim Denisovich Lysenko to a peasant family that resided in Karlivka, Poltava Oblast, Ukraine. He was the son of Denis Lysenko and his wife Oksana. Trofim received his education from the Kiev Agricultural Institute. When he was 29, Trofim had the chance to work in Azerbaijan at an agricultural experiment station. It was then when he began his research work which would later on lead to his paper discussing vernalization—published in 1928.

This paper drew much attention for those interested in Soviet agriculture to hopefully put an end to the famine which resulted from the forced collectivization. The lack of enough winter snow destroyed the planted winter-wheat seedlings which affected the produce from which the people relied on. It was Lysenko who found a workaround in this issue when he treated the wheat seeds to deal with cold and moisture better so they would still have crops even when the seedlings are planted during spring.

Lysenko’s method of treating the seeds was something he called “Jarovization” where he used a certain chilling process to change how winter cereals behaved and make them behave more like spring cereals or “jarovoe.” This term was later on changed to vernalization. This breakthrough also made it possible to fertilize the fields without the need for fertilizers and control when the plants would bloom in more favorable weather conditions as well as control when the crops will be ripe in time for the harvest.

For this breakthrough, Lysenko was treated as a hero who was able to bring a solution to the famine and the impoverished Soviet nation accepted the findings that Lysenko had. Where he went wrong, however, was when he incorrectly made a claim that having the vernalized state was something that plants could inherit. According to him, offspring from vernalized plants would also exhibit the same behavior and that the offspring would no longer need the process of vernalization to be done to them to show the same positive behavior and controlled flowering.

Because of the breakthrough that Lysenko was able to discover, he was assigned to be in charge of the Academy of Agricultural Sciences. While he was in charge there, he was the one who oversaw the research program which was specifically dedicated for increasing the crop yields. The methods that Lysenko was able to discover were used on all the collectivized farms in the Soviet Union as well as in other places under the USSR’s influence which could also benefit from these agricultural methods.

Since all experiments were funded by the government and Lysenko had a certain hold on Stalin after being able to dazzle him into believing everything he said, Lysenko was safe from scrutiny by other scientists who believed in other solutions to the famine or those who contradicted Lysenko’s claim on his findings. As long as he was under Stalin’s protection, Lysenko was safe from the criticism of other scientists regardless of how factual their findings were. If a scientist so much as countered Lysenko and made it known to Stalin, it was almost as good as suicide and the end to one’s scientific career. Only a handful of scientists ever tried and those who did were sent to be imprisoned in the gulag.

Positive Contributions

Despite the falsified claim of having vernalization as something which can be inherited by untreated plans, Lysenko was able to contribute positive results to agriculture. For areas in the Soviet Union where they had little rainfall during the summer, they used vernalization where the chilled seeds of winter grains were planted during the spring to have the yields they need. It was in 1935 when he proposed planting some potatoes in the hot and dry regions. He also created spring wheat which was suitable depending on where they were going to be planted.

He was able to bring about a great increase in the harvest of millet which was highly important in being able to feed the soldiers who belonged to the Red Army during the time of the Great Patriotic war. Through cluster planting, Lysenko was also able to increase kok-sagyz yields and he had the solution for countering the effects of over wintering of wheat harvested in Siberia. Because of these obvious discoveries and the payoffs of his vernalization, the people of Russia loved him. Lysenko’s findings came at a time when times were hard especially for those who were dependent on the produce and his breakthrough was what helped regain not just produce but the order which had been lost when collectivized farmers had begun acting against the government because of the lack of yields.

His Later Years

When Stalin died in 1953, Lysenko was still supported by the new leader who was Nikita Khrushchev. The problem was that more mainstream scientists emerged and this was when three scientists, namely Pyotr Kapitsa, Vitaly Ginzburg, and Yakov Borisovich Zel’dovich presented a case which debunked the works and claims of Lysenko. They also pointed out how Lysenko made use of his political influence to protect him from criticism and denounced those who were making a valid fight to reveal factual claims.

In 1964, the physicist named Andrei Sakharov countered Lysenko’s claims and spoke to the General Assembly of the Academy of Sciences. Because of his speech, the media began to spread anti-Lysenko articles and a certain devastating critique was made public and this had caused Lysenko to be disgraced from his own nation. His work, however, was still used in China even after years after that incident.

Offline MysteRy

Re: ~ Famous Scientists ~
« Reply #239 on: July 14, 2014, 05:46:22 PM »
Tycho Brahe



Tyge Ottesen Brahe, more commonly known as Tycho Brahe (latinized form), was an eminent Danish astronomer and alchemist. He played a vital role in the development of various astronomical instruments. Brahe is also known for his precise and comprehensive astronomical and planetary observations, which heavily influenced future discoveries.

Early Life and Education:

Born at Knutstorp Castle, Scania in 1546, Tycho Brahe was raised in an influential and noble Danish family. He received his early education in a Latin school. Brahe entered the University of Copenhagen when he was only 12. After initially studying law, he soon gained an interest in astronomy, having witnessed a great sun eclipse when he was 13 years old. Tycho later attended the Universities of Rostock and Basel.

Contributions and Achievements:

The brilliant astronomical observations of Tycho Brahe were highly influential to the scientific revolution. He made amazingly accurate and precise astronomical observations for his times, even without the help of the telescope. Brahe was an active participant to the debates on the nature of the Universe. Although better known as a famed astronomer, Tycho Brahe also played a crucial role in the development of geodesy and cartography.

Instruments built by Brahe proved to be very helpful in accurate determinations of latitude and longitude. His groundbreaking contribution to lunar theory was his renowned discovery of the variation of the Moon’s longitude. The maps of Hven drawn by Brahe were one of the earliest in the whole of Scandinavia to use systematic triangulation.

Later Life and Death:

Tycho Brahe died on October 24, 1601 in Prague, Czechia, supposedly due to bladder complications. He was 54 years old.