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Actonian Prize
The Actonian Prize was established by the Royal Institution as a septennial award for the "person who in the judgement of the committee of managers for the time being of the Institution, should have been the author of the best essay illustrative of the wisdom and beneficence of the Almighty, in such department of science as the committee of managers should, in their discretion, have selected". Each year the prize was to be awarded, announcements were published, and competitors for the prize were requested to send their essays to the Secretary of Royal Institution, Albemarle Street, London, and adjudication was made by the managers and announced a few months later. The prize was named for Hannah Acton who in 1838 left £1,000 to the Royal Institution in memory of her husband, the architect Samuel Acton, the income from which was to be spent for prizes for the best essay on the beneficence of the Almighty, as illustrative of a department of science.Benjamin Vincent, '' Haydn's Dictio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Royal Institution
The Royal Institution of Great Britain (often the Royal Institution, Ri or RI) is an organisation for scientific education and research, based in the City of Westminster. It was founded in 1799 by the leading British scientists of the age, including Henry Cavendish and its first president, George Finch. Its foundational principles were diffusing the knowledge of, and facilitating the general introduction of useful mechanical inventions and improvements, as well as enhancing the application of science to the common purposes of life (including through teaching, courses of philosophical lectures, and experiments). Much of the Institution's initial funding and the initial proposal for its founding were given by the Society for Bettering the Conditions and Improving the Comforts of the Poor, under the guidance of philanthropist Sir Thomas Bernard and American-born British scientist Sir Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford. Since its founding it has been based at 21 Albemarle Stree ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Gabriel Stokes
Sir George Gabriel Stokes, 1st Baronet, (; 13 August 1819 – 1 February 1903) was an Irish mathematician and physicist. Born in County Sligo, Ireland, Stokes spent his entire career at the University of Cambridge, where he served as the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics for 54 years, from 1849 until his death in 1903, the longest tenure held by the Lucasian Professor. As a physicist, Stokes made seminal contributions to fluid mechanics, including the Navier–Stokes equations; and to physical optics, with notable works on Polarization (waves), polarisation and fluorescence. As a mathematician, he popularised "Stokes' theorem" in vector calculus and contributed to the theory of asymptotic expansions. Stokes, along with Felix Hoppe-Seyler, first demonstrated the oxygen transport function of haemoglobin, and showed colour changes produced by the aeration of haemoglobin solutions. Stokes was made a baronet by the British monarch in 1889. In 1893 he received the Royal Society's Copl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ralph Louis Wain
Ralph Louis Wain CBE FRS (29 May 1911 Hyde, Cheshire – 14 December 2000 Canterbury) was a British agricultural chemist. He read Chemistry at the University of Sheffield on scholarship, and with first class honours degree, and a Master of Science and PhD. He was advised by G.M. Bennett. He lectured in chemistry at the South Eastern Agricultural College at Wye, until 1939. During World War II, he conducted research at Long Ashton Research Station, at the University of Bristol. After the war, he was Head of the Chemistry Department and the Chair of Agricultural Chemistry at Wye College. He was Honorary Director of the Unit on Plant Growth Substances and Selective Fungicides at Wye. He lectured at University of Kent at Canterbury where he was Honorary Professor in 1977. He was married and had two children. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alexander Fleming
Sir Alexander Fleming (6 August 1881 – 11 March 1955) was a Scottish physician and microbiologist, best known for discovering the world's first broadly effective antibiotic substance, which he named penicillin. His discovery in 1928 of what was later named benzylpenicillin (or penicillin G) from the mould ''Penicillium rubens'' has been described as the "single greatest victory ever achieved over disease". For this discovery, he shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1945 with Howard Florey and Ernst Chain. He also discovered the enzyme lysozyme from his nasal discharge in 1922, and along with it a bacterium he named ''Micrococcus lysodeikticus'', later renamed ''Micrococcus luteus''. Fleming was Knight Bachelor, knighted for his scientific achievements in 1944. In 1999, he was named in ''Time (magazine), Time'' magazine's list of the Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century, 100 Most Important People of the 20th century. In 2002, he was chosen in th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Astbury
William Thomas Astbury FRS (25 February 1898 – 4 June 1961) was an English physicist and molecular biologist who made pioneering X-ray diffraction studies of biological molecules. His work on keratin provided the foundation for Linus Pauling's discovery of the α-helix. He also studied the structure for DNA in 1937 and made the first step in the elucidation of its structure. Early life Astbury was the fourth child of seven, born in Longton, Stoke-on-Trent. His father, William Edwin Astbury, was a potter and provided comfortably for his family. Astbury also had a younger brother, Norman, with whom he shared a love of music. Astbury might well have become a potter but, luckily, won a scholarship to Longton High School, where his interests were shaped by the Headmaster and second master, both chemists. After becoming head boy and winning the Duke of Sutherland's gold medal, Astbury won the only local scholarship available and went up to Jesus College, Cambridge. A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Archibald Vivian Hill
Archibald Vivian Hill (26 September 1886 – 3 June 1977), better known to friends and colleagues as A. V. Hill, was a British physiologist, one of the founders of the diverse disciplines of biophysics and operations research. He shared the 1922 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his elucidation of the production of heat and mechanical work in muscles. Biography Born in Bristol, he was educated at Blundell's School and graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge as third wrangler in the mathematics tripos before turning to physiology. While still an undergraduate at Trinity College, he derived in 1909 what came to be known as the Langmuir equation. This is closely related to Michaelis–Menten kinetics. In this paper, Hill's first publication, he derived both the equilibrium form of the Langmuir equation, and also the exponential approach to equilibrium. The paper, written under the supervision of John Newport Langley, is a landmark in the history of receptor theory, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Ellery Hale
George Ellery Hale (June 29, 1868 – February 21, 1938) was an American astrophysicist, best known for his discovery of magnetic fields in sunspots, and as the leader or key figure in the planning or construction of several world-leading telescopes; namely, the 40-inch refracting telescope at Yerkes Observatory, 60-inch Hale telescope, 60-inch Hale reflecting telescope at Mount Wilson Observatory, 100-inch Hooker telescope, 100-inch Hooker reflecting telescope at Mount Wilson, and the 200-inch Hale Telescope, 200-inch Hale reflecting telescope at Palomar Observatory. He played a key role in the foundation of the International Union for Cooperation in Solar Research and the National Research Council (United States), National Research Council, and in developing the California Institute of Technology into a leading research university. Early life and education George Ellery Hale was born on June 29, 1868, in Chicago, Illinois, to William Ellery Hale and Mary Browne.Adams 19 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marie Curie
Maria Salomea Skłodowska-Curie (; ; 7 November 1867 – 4 July 1934), known simply as Marie Curie ( ; ), was a Polish and naturalised-French physicist and chemist who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity. She was List of female Nobel laureates, the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, the first person Nobel Prize#Multiple laureates, to win a Nobel Prize twice, and the only person to win a Nobel Prize in two scientific fields. Her husband, Pierre Curie, was a co-winner of her first Nobel Prize, making them the Nobel Prize#Statistics, first married couple to win the Nobel Prize and launching the Nobel Prize#Family laureates, Curie family legacy of five Nobel Prizes. She was, in 1906, the first woman to become a professor at the University of Paris. She was born in Warsaw, in what was then the Congress Poland, Kingdom of Poland, part of the Russian Empire. She studied at Warsaw's clandestine Flying University and began her practical scientific training in Warsaw. In 1 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Huggins
Sir William Huggins (7 February 1824 – 12 May 1910) was a British astronomer best known for his pioneering work in astronomical spectroscopy together with his wife, Margaret. Biography William Huggins was born at Cornhill, Middlesex, in 1824. In 1875, he married Margaret Lindsay, daughter of John Murray of Dublin, who also had an interest in astronomy and scientific research. She encouraged her husband's photography and helped to put their research on a systematic footing. Huggins built a private observatory at 90 Upper Tulse Hill, London, from where he and his wife carried out extensive observations of the spectral emission lines and absorption lines of various celestial objects. On 29 August 1864, Huggins was the first to take the spectrum of a planetary nebula when he analysed NGC 6543. He was also the first to distinguish between nebulae and galaxies by showing that some (like the Orion Nebula) had pure emission spectra characteristic of gas, while others like ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Agnes Mary Clerke
Agnes Mary Clerke (10 February 1842 – 20 January 1907) was an Irish astronomer and writer. She was born in Skibbereen, County Cork, Ireland, and died in London. Family Agnes Clerke was the daughter of John William Clerke (c. 1814–1890) who was, at the time, a bank manager in Skibbereen, and his wife Catherine Mary Deasy (born circa 1819) whose father was a judge's registrar. She had two siblings; her older sister, Ellen Mary (1840-1906) and her younger brother, Aubrey St. John (1843-1923). Her elder sister Ellen also wrote about astronomy. All of the Clerke children were entirely home schooled. Catherine Clerke was educated at the Ursuline Convent school, and therefore placed a great deal of importance on the education of young girls. Life and work Following in her father's footsteps—while studying classics, he had also taken courses in astronomy—she developed an interest in astronomy from an early age. Using her father's 4-inch telescope in her observations, she ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Simonds Boulger
George Simonds Boulger (1853–1922) was an English botanist. Boulger wrote articles as the Kew Gardens Correspondent of ''The Times'', and other works on botany and natural history. Life George Boulger was born at Bletchingly, Surrey, the son of Edward Boulger MD. He was a cousin of the sculptor, George Blackall Simonds. He was educated at Wellington College and Epsom College and the Middle Temple. At the age of 23 he became Professor of Natural History at the Royal Agricultural College, Cirencester, and after holding the chair for 30 years he was appointed Honorary Professor. He had also been Lecturer on Botany and Geology at the City of London College, since 1884, and at the Imperial Institute since 1917. Professor Boulger was an active member of public associations for natural history and botany, the Selborne Society, the Essex Field Club, the South-Eastern Union of Scientific Societies. He died in Richmond, Surrey on 4 May 1922. Works Boulger's works were published in many ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Samuel Acton
Samuel Acton (c. 1773 – January 1837) was an English architect, surveyor and artist. Life Acton was the nephew and pupil of Nathaniel Wright, a London carpenter and surveyor. He entered the Royal Academy Schools in 1790, and studied there for at least four years, receiving the silver medal in 1794. He exhibited at the Academy from 1791 to 1802. His address is given in the catalogues as Hatton Garden throughout this period: "at Mr Wright's" in 1791, at number 75 from 1792, and number 78 in 1802. His exhibits included a drawing of the interior of St Botolph's church (1791), and designs for mansions, villas and baths. Little is known of his professional career, except that he held the post of Surveyor to the Commissioners of Sewers for the City of London, and that in 1822 he was President of the Surveyors Club. At his death in January 1837, he was living at Chalfont St. Peter, Buckinghamshire. Among his bequests he left £500 to establish a charitable fund for the be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
