1759 in science

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The year 1759 in science and technology involved several significant events.

Astronomy[edit]

Halley's Comet returns; a team of three mathematicians, Alexis Clairaut, Jérome Lalande and Nicole Reine Lepaute, have – for the first time – predicted the date.

Caspar Friedrich Wolff's dissertation at the University of Halle Theoria Generationis supports the theory of epigenesis.^[1]

Kew Gardens established in England by Augusta of Saxe-Coburg, the mother of George III.^[2]

Giovanni Arduino proposes dividing the geological history of Earth into four periods: Primitive, Secondary, Tertiary and Volcanic, or Quaternary.^[3]

June 15 – The first vascular surgery in history is performed by a Dr. Hallowell at Newcastle upon Tyne in England, who uses suture repair rather than a tying off with a ligature to repair an aneurysm on a patient's brachial artery.^[4]^[5] The new procedure of reconstructing a damaged artery replaces the practice of ligation that had risked the amputation of a limb or organ failure.^[6]
Angélique du Coudray publishes Abrégé de l'art des accouchements ("The Art of Obstetrics").

Posthumous publication of Émilie du Châtelet's French translation and commentary on Newton's Principia, Principes mathématiques de la philosophie naturelle.

English clockmaker John Harrison produces his "No. 1 sea watch" ("H4"), the first successful marine chronometer.^[7]

James Brindley is engaged by the Duke of Bridgewater to construct a canal to transport coal to Manchester from the duke's mines at Worsley, in North West England.
October 16 – Smeaton's Tower, John Smeaton's Eddystone Lighthouse off the coast of South West England, is first illuminated.^[8]

January 29 – Louis Augustin Guillaume Bosc, French botanist (died 1828)
July 19 – Jacques Anselme Dorthès, French physician, entomologist and naturalist (died 1794)^[10]
August 12 – Thomas Andrew Knight, English horticulturalist (died 1838)
September 19 – William Kirby, English entomologist (died 1850)
December 2 – James Edward Smith, English botanist (died 1828)
Date unknown – Maria Petraccini, Italian anatomist and physician (died 1791)

^ Petrunkevitch, Alexander (June 1920). "Russia's Contribution to Science". Transactions of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences. 23. New Haven: 235.
^ "Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew". World Heritage. UNESCO. Archived from the original on 17 August 2010. Retrieved 2010-07-04.
^ Bates, Marston (1950). The Nature of Natural History. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. p. 51.
^ Lambert, Richard (1761). "A new technique of treating an aneurysm". Medical Observations and Inquiries.
^ Ikuta, Yoshikazu (2012). "History of Microsurery". Telemicrosurgery: Robot Assisted Microsurgery. Springer. p. 5.
^ Friedman, Steven G. (2008). A History of Vascular Surgery. John Wiley & Sons. p. ix.
^ Royal Greenwich Observatory (2012). Royal Observatory Greenwich souvenir guide. pp. 34–35. ISBN 978-1-906367-51-0. the first precision watch and considered by many today as the most important timekeeper ever.
^ "Eddystone Lighthouse". Trinity House. Archived from the original on 9 September 2006. Retrieved 2006-09-06.
^ "Copley Medal | British scientific award". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 21 July 2020.
^ Nicolas, Michel (5 August 2016). Histoire littéraire de Nîmes et des localités voisines qui forment actuellement le département du Gard (in French). Paris: BnF collection ebooks. ISBN 9782346019731. Retrieved 25 February 2021.