| MARCH 28 - BIRTHS | |
| Jerome Isaac Friedman | |
 Born 28
Mar 1930
American physicist who, together with Richard E. Taylor and Henry W. Kendall, received the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1990 for their joint experimental confirmation of the fundamental particles known as quarks. |
|
| Alexandre Grothendieck | |
| Born 28
Mar 1928
German-French mathematician who was awarded the Fields Medal in 1966 for his work in algebraic geometry. |
|
| Victor Mills | |
(source) |
Born 28
Mar 1897; died 1 Nov 1997
American chemical engineer who inventedPampers disposable diapers. He joined Proctor& Gamble company in 1926, and soon after developed a continuous process to superheat the liquid soap and spray it in concentrated form through an extruder producing bars of Ivory soap. That cut the production time from seven days to just a couple of hours. He improved Duncan Hines cake mixes by passing ingredients through large milling drums designed to polish aluminum foil but made the finished cake less lumpy. He developed a process for preventing the oil from separating in Jif peanut butter. His invention of disposable diapers as a product was created to utilize the clean, absorbent paper available from a pulp mill acquired by the company. |
| Corneille Heymans | |
| Born 28
Mar 1892; died 18 Jul 1968.
Belgian physiologist who received the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1938 for his discovery of the regulatory effect on respiration of sensory organs associated with the carotid artery in the neck and with the aortic arch leading from the heart. |
|
| Willy Kühne | |
(source) |
Born 28
Mar 1837; died 10 June 1900.
Wilhelm Friedrich Kühne was a German physiologist known for his researches on vision and the chemical changes occurring in the retina under the influence of light. His original work falls into two main groups—the physiology of muscle and nerve, which occupied the earlier years of his life, and the chemistry of digestion, which he began to investigate while at Berlin with Virchow. He was proposed the word enzyme meaning "in yeast" (1878), and he isolated trypsin from pancreatic juice. He demonstrated usefulness of cytophysiological investigations for solving problems of general physiology. He devised an "artificial eye," discovered the light sensitive "visual purple" in the retina and was first to perceive migrating pigments in the living retina (1877-78). |
| Sir Joseph William Bazalgette | |
(source) |
Born 28
Mar 1819; died 15 Mar 1891.
British civil engineer who designed the main drainage system for London. As an engineer, he built some major bridges in London, but his greatest accomplishment was to solve a growing problem with sewage pollution in the Thames River. By the mid-1800s, so many Londoners were using the new "water closets" that the river was horribly polluted with sewage. The "Great Stink" crisis escalated with cholera outbreaks. Bazalgette was chosen to design and build London's sewer system, a 20-year project. Some of his ideas still influence urban engineering today. |
| Henry Rowe Schoolcraft | |
(source) |
Born 28
Mar 1793; died 10 Dec 1864.
American explorer and ethnologist noted for his discovery of the source of the Mississippi River (1832) in a lake in northern Minnesota which he named Lake Itasca, from the Latin words caput (head) and veritas (true). His early interest was rocks and minerals, which led to a geological survey expedition, then employment as a map-maker and government agent on the Northwest Frontier, near Lake Superior. He became interested in Native Americans and from these studies wrote about their history, language, mythology, hieroglyphics, picture writing, maxims, characteristics and potential, religious beliefs, and influence of Christian missionaries. Further, he addressed the past and future roles of the federal government and the Indian. |
|
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| MARCH 28 - DEATHS | |
| William Francis Giauque | |
(source) |
 Died
28 Mar 1982 (born 12 May 1895)
Canadian-born American physical chemist and winner of the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1949 for his "achievements in the field of chemical thermodynamics and especially his work on the behavior of matter at very low temperatures and his closely allied studies of entropy." He is remembered particularly for his discovery of adiabatic demagnetization as a means to reach temperatures close to absolute zero as well as for his exhaustive and meticulous thermodynamic studies, over a lifetime of research, which utilized the third law of thermodynamics while also developing a large body of evidence for its validity. |
| Wilhelm Körner | |
(source) |
Died
28 Mar 1925 (born 20 Apr 1839)
German organic chemist who established in 1874 how to determine the positions of the substituents on di- and tri-substituted isomers of the benzene ring by counting product or source isomers (five years before the van't Hoff-Le Bel hypothesis of tetrahedral carbon.) Because the 1,2-disubstituted isomer gives two products; the 1,3 gives three; and the 1,4 gives only one, both starting compounds and products can be identified. This identifies both starting materials and products.From 1864-67, Korner worked directly with August Kekulé (who realized the ring structure of benzene). The 126 aromatic compounds he prepared included pyridine (1869) and asparagine (1887, with Angelo Menozzi). He died by suicide.«  [Image:
diagram showing how each disubstituted isomer (top) produces a different
range pf possible trisubstituted products (bottom) as listed in the text
above. ] |
| Jean-Maurice-Émile Baudot | |
(source) |
Died
28 Mar 1903 (born 11 Sep 1845)
French engineer who, in 1874, received a patent on a telegraph code that by the mid-20th century had supplanted Morse Code as the most commonly used telegraphic alphabet. He dedicated his life to the development of a fast-printing telegraph. After successively improved versions, he demonstrated at the International Exhibition of Electronics a perfected model which could transmit six simultaneous messages. The Baudot system was used throughout the world for terrestrial and undersea links for over 70 years. |
| Peter Andreas Hansen | |
(EB) |
Died
28 Mar 1874 (born 8 Dec 1795)
Danish astronomer whose most important work was the improvement of the theories and tables of the orbits of the principal bodies in the solar system. Danish astronomer. At Altona observatory he assisted in measuring the arc of meridian (1821). He became the director (1825) of Seeberg observatory, which was removed to Gotha in a new observatory built for him (1857). He worked on theoretical geodesy, optics, and the theory of probability. The work in celestial mechanics for which he is best known are his theories of motion for comets, minor planets, moon and his lunar tables (1857) which were in use until 1923. He published his lunar theory in Fundamenta ("Foundation") in 1838, and Darlegung ("Explanation") in 1862-64. |
| Stephan Endlicher | |
(source) |
Died
28 Mar 1849 (born 24 Jun 1804)
Austrian botanist who formulated a major system of plant classification. In 1830, he had issued his first botanical treatise, that on the flora of Pressburg. In 1836, he was curator of a museum botanical department, and in 1840, a professor of botany and director of the Botanical Garden of the University of Vienna. While a curator he united the various distinct herbaria into one scientifically arranged general herbarium, to which he contributed his own 30,000 species of plants. His classification remained until 1885. His botanical system is explained in his well-known and most important work: Genera plantarum secundum ordines naturales disposita (Vienna, 1836-50), a work regarded as one of the fundamental writings of systematized botany. |
| William Thornton | |
| Died
28 Mar 1828 (born 20 May 1759)
British-born American architect, inventor, and public official, best known as the creator of the original design for the Capitol at Washington, D.C. |
|
| MARCH 28 - EVENTS | |
| Hooke's lost manuscript | |
(source) |
In 2006, a substantial "lost" book of manuscripts
by Robert Hooke in his own handwriting
was bought
for the Royal Society by donations
of nearly £1 million. The book was just minutes before going on the
auction block when a last-minute purchase agreement was made and kept the
precious document in Britain. Hooke is now often overlooked, except for
his law of elasticity, although in his time, he was a prolific English
scientist and contributed greatly to planning the rebuilding of London
after the Great Fire of 1666. The document of more than 520 pages of manuscripts
included the minutes of the Royal Society from 1661-82. It had been found
in a cupboard in a private house by an antiques expert there to value other
items.« |
| Three Mile Island nuclear accident | |
(source) |
In 1979, a nuclear accident occured at Unit 2 of the Three Mile Island
nuclear power plant outside Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, USA. Caused by human
and mechanical errors, a cooling system malfunctioned and permitted a partial
meltdown of the reactor's core. Efforts to re-establish cooling of the
reactor took several days. No evacuation was ordered, but 100,000 people
fled. President Carter visited
three days later. Disaster was avoided, although some radioactivity leaked
into the air. It was the worst U.S. nuclear accident to date, but no radiation
injuries were identified. On 21 Jul 1982, a video camera inspected
the damage to the core and revealed a large amount of uranium had spilled
and melted to the bottom of the pressure vessel.«
 Three
Mile Island: A Nuclear Crisis in Historical Perspective,
by J. Samuel Walker. |
| UNIVAC for Census | |
|
In 1946, the Census Bureau and the National Bureau of Standards met to
discuss
the purchase of a computer. The agencies agreed to buy UNIVAC, the world's
first general all-purpose business computer, from Presper Eckert and John
Mauchly for a mere $225,000. Unfortunately, UNIVAC cost far more than that
to develop. Eckert and Mauchly's venture floundered as the company continued
to build and program UNIVACs for far less than the development cost. Eventually,
the company was purchased by Remington Rand. |
|
| Rocketry | |
|
In 1935, Goddard used gyroscopes to control a rocket. |
|
| Microfilm | |
|
In 1922, Bradley A. Fiske of Washington, D.C., patented a microfilm reading
device. |
|
| Seaplane | |
|
In 1910, the first seaplane took off from Martigues near Marseilles, France,
designed by Frenchman Henri Fabre. |
|
| Radio fax | |
|
In 1905, the radio fax was patented in the U.S. by Cornelius Ehret
of Rosemont, Pennsylvania. His device was called "a system for transmitting
intelligence." However, faxing did not become a practical mode of communication
until the 1920s, and high-speed faxes were not available until the 1940s. |
|
| Ambulance | |
|
In 1866, the first hospital ambulance went into service. |
|
| Washing machine | |
|
In 1797, Nathaniel Briggs of New Hampshire received a patent for a washing
machine. |
|
| Franklin's electricity experiments | |
 |
In 1747, the fascination with electricity upon reaching the American colonies
was the subject of Benjamin Franklin's first of the famous series
of letters in which he described his experiments on electricity to Peter
Collinson, Esq., of London. He thanked Collison for his "kind present of
an electric tube with directions for using it" with which he and others
did electrical experiments. "For my own part I never was before engaged
in any study that so totally engrossed my attention and my time as this
has lately done; for what with making experiments when I can be alone,
and repeating them to my friends and acquaintances, who, from the novelty
of the thing, come continually in crowds to see them, I have, during some
months past, had little leisure for anything else."« [Quoted
from: "Franklin's Researches in Electricity" by Professor Edward L. Nichols
in The Record of the Celebration of the Two Hundredth Anniversary of
the Birth of Benjamin Franklin, published by the American Philosophical
Society (1906)] |
