1991 in science

none 1991 science 1991 The year 1991 in science and technology involved many significant events, some listed below. Astronomy and space exploration April 5 – Space Shuttle Atlantis leaves an observatory in Earth's orbit to study gamma rays before returning on April 11. It is followed by Space Shuttle Discovery, which studies instruments related to the Strategic Defense Initiative from April 29 to May 6. Space Shuttle Columbia carries the Spacelab into orbit on June 5. May 18 – Helen Sharman becomes the first British person in space, flying with the Soyuz TM-12 mission.https://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/may/18/newsid_2380000/2380649.stm 1991: Sharman becomes first Briton in space BBC News 2008-02-01 1991-05-18 https://web.archive.org/web/20080307014408/http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/may/18/newsid_2380000/2380649.stm 2008-03-07 live October 29 – The Galileo probe becomes the first spacecraft to visit an asteroid (951 Gaspra). Steven Balbus and John F. Hawley publish their insights on magnetorotational instability.Balbus Steven A. Hawley John F. 1991 A powerful local shear instability in weakly magnetized disks The Astrophysical Journal 376 214–233 1991ApJ...376..214B 10.1086/170270 Asteroid 6859 Datemasamune is discovered by Masahiro Koishikawa. Asteroid 11514 Tsunenaga is discovered by Masahiro Koishikawa. There are four lunar eclipses: three penumbral on January 30, July 26, and June 27, and one minor partial lunar eclipse on December 21. There are two solar eclipses: one annular eclipse on January 15, and a very long total eclipse on July 11 (lasting 6 minutes and 53 seconds). Chemistry Carbon nanotubes discovered in the insoluble material of arc-burned graphite rods by Sumio Iijima of NEC.Sumio Iijima Helical microtubules of graphitic carbon Nature 354 56–58 7 November 1991 10.1038/354056a0 6348 1991Natur.354...56I 4302490Who should be given the credit for the discovery of carbon nanotubes? 10.1016/j.carbon.2006.03.019 Marc Monthioux Carbon 44 2006 http://www.cemes.fr/fichpdf/GuestEditorial.pdf 1621 Kuznetsov Vladimir L. 9 2006Carbo..44.1621M 2012-02-03 2009-09-29 https://web.archive.org/web/20090929073818/http://www.cemes.fr/fichpdf/GuestEditorial.pdf dead Computer science February 20 – Python, a programming language created by Guido van Rossum, Is released.https://www.tuhs.org/Usenet/alt.sources/1991-February/001749.html Python 0.9.1 part 01/21 alt.sources archives 2021-08-11 11 August 2021 https://web.archive.org/web/20210811171015/https://www.tuhs.org/Usenet/alt.sources/1991-February/001749.html live February 26 – Tim Berners-Lee, an English computer scientist working at CERN, introduces WorldWideWeb (the first web browser), and a WYSIWYG HTML editor. May 14 – Nicola Pellow, an intern working under the direction of Berners-Lee, introduces Line Mode Browser, the first cross-platform web browser. June 5 – Phil Zimmermann posts the first Pretty Good Privacy (PGP) data encryption program.http://www.philzimmermann.com/EN/news/PGP_10thAnniversary.html PGP Marks 10th Anniversary Philip Zimmermann 2001-06-05 2012-01-28 2011-05-14 https://web.archive.org/web/20110514200112/http://www.philzimmermann.com/EN/news/PGP_10thAnniversary.html dead June 23 – The video game Sonic the Hedgehog is first released, propelling the Sega Genesis 16-bit console into mass popularity. August 6 – The first website goes online at CERN.Welcome to info.cern.ch, the website of the world's first-ever web server CERN http://info.cern.ch/ 25 May 2008 https://web.archive.org/web/20080527152659/http://info.cern.ch/ 27 May 2008 liveWorld Wide Web—Archive of world's first website World Wide Web Consortium http://www.w3.org/History/19921103-hypertext/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html 25 May 2008World Wide Web—First mentioned on USENET 6 August 1991 http://groups.google.co.uk/group/alt.hypertext/msg/06dad279804cb3ba?dmode=source&hl=en 25 May 2008 https://web.archive.org/web/20080512015304/http://groups.google.co.uk/group/alt.hypertext/msg/06dad279804cb3ba?dmode=source&hl=en 12 May 2008 deadThe original post to alt.hypertalk describing the WorldWideWeb Project Google Groups 9 August 1991 https://groups.google.com/group/comp.archives/browse_thread/thread/9fb079523583d42/37bb6783d03a3b0d?lnk=st&q=&rnum=2&hl=en#37bb6783d03a3b0d 25 May 2008 August 25 – Linus Torvalds posts messages to the Usenet newsgroup comp.os.minix, regarding the new operating system kernel he has developed, called Linux.LINUX's History by Linus Torvalds https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~awb/linux.history.html June 13, 2021 cs.cmu.edu September 14, 2023 https://web.archive.org/web/20230914053148/https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~awb/linux.history.html liveHistory https://tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/html/sect_01_01.html June 13, 2021 tldp.org June 16, 2021 https://web.archive.org/web/20210616043353/https://tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/html/sect_01_01.html live October – Apple releases the PowerBook laptop computer. The Trojan Room coffee pot at the Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge, England, inspires the first webcam. Conservation October 1 – The New Zealand Resource Management Act 1991 comes into effect. Geophysics Alan Hildebrand and others provide support for the Alvarez hypothesis for the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event by proposing the Chicxulub crater in the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico as the impact site for a large asteroid 66 million years ago.Pope, Kevin O. Mexican site for K/T impact crater? Nature 351 9 May 1991 105 6322 10.1038/351105a0 1991Natur.351..105P 36707836 etal freeHildebrand, Alan R. Penfield, Glen T. Kring, David A. Pilkington, Mark Zanoguera, Antonio Camargo Jacobsen, Stein B. Boynton, William V. Chicxulub Crater: a possible Cretaceous/Tertiary Boundary impact crater on the Yucatán Peninsula, Mexico September 1991 19 9 Geology 867–871 10.1130/0091-7613(1991)019<0867:CCAPCT>2.3.CO;2 1991Geo....19..867HSchulte, Peter The Chicxulub Asteroid Impact and Mass Extinction at the Cretaceous- Paleogene Boundary Science 327 1214–1218 2010 10.1126/science.1177265 20203042 5970 2010Sci...327.1214S 2659741 http://doc.rero.ch/record/210367/files/PAL_E4389.pdf etal The Ames crater impact structure is identified in Major County, Oklahoma. Mathematics July – English physicist Philip Candelas and colleagues show that mirror symmetry could be used to solve problems in enumerative geometry.Candelas Philip de la Ossa Xenia Green Paul Parks Linda 1991 A pair of Calabi–Yau manifolds as an exactly soluble superconformal field theory Nuclear Physics B 359 1 21–74 10.1016/0550-3213(91)90292-6 1991NuPhB.359...21C Qiudong Wang produces a global solution to the n-body problem.Wang Qiudong The global solution of the n-body problem Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy 0923-2958 50 1 1991 73–88 1990CeMDA..50...73W 10.1007/BF00048987 118132097 Physics January 1 – Finland joins CERN. July 1 – Poland joins CERN. October 15 – the "Oh-My-God particle", the first ultra-high-energy cosmic ray measured at an energy of 3 20 eV (40,000,000 times that of the highest energy protons that have been produced in a particle accelerator), is observed at the University of Utah HiRes observatory in Dugway Proving Ground, Utah. Physiology and medicine Takotsubo cardiomyopathy first studied. Technology July 1 – World's first GSM telephone call made in Finland. Publications The first open-access scientific online archive, arXiv, is begun as a preprint service for physicists, initiated by Paul Ginsparg. Awards Nobel Prizes Physics – Pierre-Gilles de Gennes Chemistry – Richard R. Ernst Medicine – Erwin Neher, Bert Sakmann Turing Award – Robin Milner Births February 28 – Sheree Atcheson, Sri Lankan-Irish computer scientist Hong Wang, Chinese mathematician2026-07-23 Wang Hong and Deng Yu become first Chinese nationals to win Fields Medal https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3361633/fields-medal-win-wang-hong-deng-yu-are-first-chinese-nationals-score-top-maths-honour 2026-07-23 South China Morning Post en 23 July 2026 https://web.archive.org/web/20260723182605/https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3361633/fields-medal-win-wang-hong-deng-yu-are-first-chinese-nationals-score-top-maths-honour live Deaths January 30 – John Bardeen (b. 1908), American physicist, co-inventor of the transistor and twice winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics. February 6 – Salvador Luria (b. 1912), Italian-born biologist, co-winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. February 23 – Sir Charles Illingworth (b. 1899), British surgeon. March 1 – Edwin H. Land (b. 1909), American inventor of the Land Camera. June 2 – Mary Loveless (b. 1899), American immunologist. June 5 – Min Chueh Chang (b. 1908), Chinese American embryologist. July 4 – Victor Chang (b. 1936), Australian cardiac surgeon, murdered. August 23 – Florence B. Seibert (b. 1897), American biochemist. December 2 – Anne Beloff-Chain (b. 1921), British biochemist. References 1990s Science Category:20th century in science Category:1990s in science