1683 in science explained

The year 1683 in science and technology involved some significant events.

Geography

• Vincenzo Coronelli completes terrestrial and celestial globes for Louis XIV of France.

Biology

• September 17 – Antonie van Leeuwenhoek writes a letter to the Royal Society of London describing "animalcules" – the first known description of protozoa.^[1]

Mathematics

• Based on his discovery of the resultant, Seki Takakazu starts to develop elimination theory in the Kai-fukudai-no-hō (解伏題之法,); and to express the resultant, he develops the notion of the determinant.^[2]
• Jacob Bernoulli discovers the mathematical constant e.^[3]

Medicine

• Dutch physician Willem ten Rhijne publishes Dissertatio de Arthritide: Mantissa Schematica: De Acupunctura in London, introducing the West to acupuncture and moxibustion.

Technology

• Vauban's manual on fortification, Le Directeur-Général des fortifications, begins publication at The Hague.

Institutions

• May 24 – The Ashmolean Museum opens in Broad Street, Oxford (England) as the world's first purpose-built university museum,^[4] including accommodation for the teaching of natural philosophy and a chemistry laboratory. Naturalist Dr. Robert Plot is the first keeper and first professor of chemistry.
• October 15 – First meeting of the Dublin Philosophical Society, established by William Molyneux.^{[5] [6] [7]}

Births

• February 28 – Rene Antoine Ferchault de Reaumur, French physicist (died 1757)
• December 23 – François Nicole, French mathematician (died 1758)
• Approximate date
  • Giovanni Poleni, Italian mathematician and physicist (died 1761)
  • Edmund Weaver, English astronomer (died 1748)

Deaths

• May 2 – Stjepan Gradić, Ragusan polymath (born 1613)
• November 10
  • John Collins, English mathematician (born 1625)
  • Robert Morison, Scottish botanist (born 1620)

Notes and References

1. Web site: Anderson . Douglas. Wrote Letter 39 of 1683-09-17 (AB 76) to Francis Aston. Lens on Leeuwenhoek. 2016-09-26. https://web.archive.org/web/20160820153516/http://lensonleeuwenhoek.net/content/wrote-letter-39-1683-09-17-ab-76-francis-aston. 2016-08-20.
2. Book: Eves, Howard. 1990. An Introduction to the History of Mathematics. Philadelphia. Saunders College. 6th. 0-03-029558-0. 405.
3. Book: Boyer, Carl. Merzbach, Uta. Uta Merzbach. A History of Mathematics. registration. 419. Wiley. 1991. 9780471543978 . 2nd.
4. Web site: Ashmolean Museum. The Invention of Museum Anthropology. Pitt Rivers Museum. Oxford. 2012. 2019-05-25.
5. Book: Medicine, Disease and the State in Ireland, 1650–1940. Greta. Jones. Elizabeth. Malcolm. 1999. Cork University Press. 91. 978-1-85918-230-7.
6. Memoir of the Dublin Philosophical Society of 1683. William Wilde. W. R.. Wilde. Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. Royal Irish Academy. Dublin. 3. 1844–47. 160–76. 20489545.
7. Web site: T. D.. Spearman. 1992. 400 Years of Mathematics. Trinity College Dublin. 2014-01-09.