1950 in science

none 1950 science 1950 thumb|220x124px | right | Operating room in Milan in 1950 The year 1950 in science and technology included some significant events around the world that are listed below. Astronomy and Space Sciences Dutch astronomer Jan Oort postulates the existence of an orbiting cloud of planets (the Oort cloud) at the outermost edge of the Solar System.Jan Oort The structure of the cloud of comets surrounding the Solar System and a hypothesis concerning its origin Bulletin of the Astronomical Institutes of the Netherlands 11 91–110 1950 1950BAN....11...91O Enrico Fermi discusses the Fermi paradox.http://www.fas.org/sgp/othergov/doe/lanl/la-10311-ms.pdf "Where is everybody?": An account of Fermi's question Eric M. Jones Los Alamos technical report March 1985 2020-01-22 2007-06-29 https://web.archive.org/web/20070629174738/http://www.fas.org/sgp/othergov/doe/lanl/la-10311-ms.pdf dead Biology Melvin Calvin, James Bassham, and Andrew Benson at the University of California, Berkeley, discover the Calvin cycle in photosynthesis.Bassham, J. Benson, A. Calvin, M. The path of carbon in photosynthesis http://www.jbc.org/cgi/reprint/185/2/781.pdf Journal of Biological Chemistry 185 2 781–7 1950 14774424 10.2172/910351 910351 2011-06-10 2009-02-19 https://web.archive.org/web/20090219123745/http://www.jbc.org/cgi/reprint/185/2/781.pdf dead Entomologist Willi Hennig publishes Grundzüge einer Theorie der phylogenetischen Systematik in East Germany, pioneering the study of cladistics. Full-scale release of myxomatosis for control of the Australian rabbit population. Chemistry February 9 – Californium, a radioactive actinide transuranium element, is first synthesized by Stanley G. Thompson, Kenneth Street Jr., Albert Ghiorso and Glenn T. Seaborg at the University of California, Berkeley.Thompson, S. G. Street Jr. K. Ghiorso, A. Seaborg, G. T. Element 98 Physical Review 1950 78 3 298 10.1103/PhysRev.78.298.2 http://escholarship.org/uc/item/44g7z6hk 1950PhRv...78..298T freeThompson, S. G. Street Jr. K. Ghiorso, A. Seaborg, G. T. The New Element Californium (Atomic Number 98) Physical Review 1950 80 5 790 10.1103/PhysRev.80.790 http://www.osti.gov/accomplishments/documents/fullText/ACC0050.pdf 1950PhRv...80..790TStreet, K. Jr. Thompson, S. G. Seaborg, G. T. Chemical Properties of Californium Journal of the American Chemical Society 1950 72 10 4832 10.1021/ja01166a528 http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA319899&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf 2027/mdp.39015086449173 2012-03-17 2012-01-19 https://web.archive.org/web/20120119092943/http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA319899&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf dead Computer science March – Publication of Claude Shannon's paper "Programming a Computer for Playing Chess", seminal in the development of computer chess and introducing the Shannon number.Claude E. Shannon Programming a Computer for Playing Chess Philosophical Magazine 41 314 256–75 http://archive.computerhistory.org/projects/chess/related_materials/text/2-0%20and%202-1.Programming_a_computer_for_playing_chess.shannon/2-0%20and%202-1.Programming_a_computer_for_playing_chess.shannon.062303002.pdf 2012-01-20 March 1950 dead https://web.archive.org/web/20100706211229/http://archive.computerhistory.org/projects/chess/related_materials/text/2-0%20and%202-1.Programming_a_computer_for_playing_chess.shannon/2-0%20and%202-1.Programming_a_computer_for_playing_chess.shannon.062303002.pdf 2010-07-06 April – Publication of Richard Hamming's paper "Error detecting and error correcting codes", seminal in the construction of error detection and correction codesR. W. Hamming Error detecting and error correcting codes http://www.lee.eng.uerj.br/~gil/redesII/hamming.pdf Bell System Technical Journal 29 2 April 1950 147–160 2012-05-12 10.1002/j.1538-7305.1950.tb00463.x 10945/46756 2012-10-15 https://web.archive.org/web/20121015031803/http://www.lee.eng.uerj.br/~gil/redesII/hamming.pdf deadhttp://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Hamming.html Richard Wesley Hamming J. J. O'Connor E. F. Robertson Edmund F. Robertson MacTutor History of Mathematics archive University of St Andrews 2012-05-12 January 2012 and from which Hamming code and the Hamming distance derive. August 25 – In the early history of video games, Bertie the Brain is first displayed to the public at the Canadian National Exhibition.http://spacing.ca/toronto/2014/08/13/meet-bertie-brain-worlds-first-arcade-game-built-toronto/ Meet Bertie the Brain, the world's first arcade game, built in Toronto Bateman Chris 2014-08-13 Spacing 2014-11-16 https://web.archive.org/web/20151222164300/http://spacing.ca/toronto/2014/08/13/meet-bertie-brain-worlds-first-arcade-game-built-toronto/ 2015-12-22 live October – Publication of Alan Turing's paper "Computing Machinery and Intelligence", seminal in the study of artificial intelligence and presenting the Turing test.A. M. Turing Computing Machinery and Intelligence http://loebner.net/Prizef/TuringArticle.html Mind 59 236 433–60 10.1093/mind/LIX.236.433 2011-11-28 October 1950 https://web.archive.org/web/20080702224846/http://loebner.net/Prizef/TuringArticle.html 2008-07-02 dead subscriptionEpstein Robert Roberts Gary Beber Grace Parsing the Turing Test: Philosophical and Methodological Issues in the Quest for the Thinking Computer New York Kluwer 2009 978-1-4020-6708-2 Mathematics John Forbes Nash Jr. proposes the Nash equilibrium in game theory, initially in his Princeton doctoral thesis.M. J. Osborne 2004 An Introduction to Game Theory Oxford University Press 23Equilibrium Points in N-person Games Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 1950 48–9 1 16588946 Nash J. F. 36 1063129 10.1073/pnas.36.1.48 0031701 1950PNAS...36...48N free.Nash J. F. The Bargaining Problem Econometrica 1950 155–62 18 2 0035977 10.2307/1907266 1907266. The prisoner's dilemma is framed by Merrill Flood and Melvin Dresher at RAND and formalized and named by Albert W. Tucker.Poundstone William 1992 Prisoner's Dilemma Doubleday New York 978-0385415675 https://archive.org/details/prisonersdilemma00poun Medicine June 17 – The first cadaveric internal kidney transplantation is performed on Ruth Tucker, a 44-year-old woman with polycystic kidney disease, at Little Company of Mary Hospital (Evergreen Park), Illinois. Although the donated kidney is rejected 10 months later because no effective immunosuppressive drugs have been developed at this time, the intervening time gives Tucker's remaining kidney time to recover and she lives another 5 years.Organ transplantation David Petechuk Greenwood 2006 978-0-313-33542-6 11 https://archive.org/details/organtransplanta0000pete registration kidney transplant ruth tucker. October – Australian-born British thoracic surgeon Norman Barrett describes the condition which will become known as Barrett's oesophagus.Barrett N. R. Chronic Peptic Ulcer of the Œsophagus and 'Œsophagitis' British Journal of Surgery 38 150 175–82 October 1950 14791960 10.1002/bjs.18003815005 72315839 November – Eugene Roberts and Sam Frankel of Washington University School of Medicine report their discovery that GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid) is produced from glutamic acid and accumulates in the mammalian central nervous system, using newly developed techniques of chromatography to analyze protein-free extracts of mammalian brain.Spiering Martin J. December 2018 The discovery of GABA in the brain https://www.asbmb.org/asbmb-today/science/010119/jbc-the-discovery-of-gaba-in-the-brain Journal of Biological Chemistry 293 49 19159–19160 10.1074/jbc.cl118.006591 0021-9258 6295731 30530855 freeRoberts E. Frankel S. November 1950 gamma-Aminobutyric acid in brain: its formation from glutamic acid Journal of Biological Chemistry 187 1 55–63 10.1016/S0021-9258(19)50929-2 free 0021-9258 14794689 December 11 – The typical antipsychotic Chlorpromazine is first synthesized. Antihistamine discovered. The Duffy antigen is identified in a multiply-transfused hemophiliac patient.A New Human Blood Group Nature 1950-02-04 Cutbush M. Mollison P.L. Parkin D.M. 165 4188 188–189 10.1038/165188b0 1950Natur.165..188C 4265241 An external artificial pacemaker is developed by John A. Hopps in conjunction with Wilfred Gordon Bigelow at Toronto General Hospital. Physics July – Oleg Lavrentiev outlines the concept of the tokamak.R. G. Sharma 2015 https://books.google.com/books?id=jbvdBgAAQBAJ&q=Tokamak+T-1+1958 Superconductivity: Basics and Applications to Magnets 311 Springer 9783319137131 2019-06-27 John Ward derives the Ward–Takahashi identity in quantum field theory.J. C. Ward An identity in quantum electrodynamics Physical Review 78 2 182 1950 10.1103/PhysRev.78.182 1950PhRv...78..182W Technology October 11 – A field-sequential color system developed by Hungarian American engineer Dr. Peter Goldmark becomes the first color television system to be adopted for commercial use (by CBS in the United States), but is abandoned a year later.C.B.S. Color Video Starts Nov. 20; Adapters Needed by Present Sets The New York Times 1950-10-12 1Radio and Television Regulation: Broadcast Technology in the United States 1920–1960 Hugh Richard Slotten JHU Press 2000 978-0-8018-6450-6 https://books.google.com/books?id=cZLQ9R5GKfsC&q=%22Field+sequential+color+system%22&pg=PR11 Canadians Harry Wasylyk, Larry Hansen and Frank Plomp introduce the plastic bin bag for garbage collection.CBC Television http://www.cbc.ca/inventions/inventions.html?inventionID=21 The Greatest Canadian Invention dead https://web.archive.org/web/20101030012347/http://www.cbc.ca/inventions/inventions.html?inventionID=21 October 30, 2010 First practical pager, developed and manufactured by the Reevesound Company, is introduced for physicians in the New York City area.https://books.google.com/books?id=ZyEDAAAAMBAJ&q=popular+science+1950+can+our+jets+support&pg=PA104 Pocket Radio Pages Doctors Night Or Day Popular Science January 1951 Events August 12 – In his encyclical Humani generis, Pope Pius XII declares evolution to be a serious hypothesis that does not contradict essential Roman Catholic teachings. J. Z. Young delivers the BBC Reith Lectures on Doubt and Certainty in Science, introducing the radio audience to current developments in neurophysiology. Awards Fields Prize in Mathematics (first postwar award): Laurent Schwartz and Atle Selberg Nobel Prizes Physics – Cecil Frank Powell Chemistry – Otto Paul Hermann Diels, Kurt Alder Medicine – Edward Calvin Kendall, Tadeus Reichstein, Philip Showalter Hench Births March 2 – James W. Pennebaker, American social psychologist. March 5 – Henry Marsh, English neurosurgeon. March 18 – Linda Partridge, English biogerontologist. May 3 – Kensō Soai, Japanese organic chemist, Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2026.for the discovery of non-linear effects and autocatalysis in asymmetric organic synthesis. Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2026 https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2026/press-release/ 2026-10-07 2026-10-07 NobelPrize.org en-US Nobel Foundation May 16 – Georg Bednorz, German physicist, Nobel Prize in Physics 1987. June 8 – Stanley J. Korsmeyer (died 2005), American cell biologist. July 4 – Steven Sasson, American electrical engineer. October 21 – Ronald McNair (died on mission 1986), African American physicist and astronaut. November 1 – Robert B. Laughlin, American physicist, Nobel Prize in Physics 1998. November 3 – James Rothman, American cell biologist, Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2013. November 22 – Eva-Maria Neher, née Ruhr, German biochemist. December 13 – Julia Slingo, English meteorologist. December 27 – Joe Armstrong (died 2019), English computer scientist. December 28 – Frank Kelly, British mathematician. Deaths February 25 – George Minot (born 1885), American physician, Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1934. March – John Ryle (born 1889), English physician and epidemiologist. April 1 – Charles R. Drew (born 1904), African American physician, pioneer in blood transfusion. April 28 – Oakes Ames (born 1874), American botanist. September 10 – Annie Montague Alexander (born 1867), American paleontologist. September 21 – Arthur Milne (born 1896), English space physicist. December 11 – Leslie Comrie (born 1893), New Zealand astronomer and computing pioneer. References Category:20th century in science Category:1950s in science