The year 1823 in science and technology involved some significant events, listed below.

Astronomy

• Olbers' paradox is described by the German astronomer Heinrich Wilhelm Matth us Olbers.
• December 29 - Great Comet of 1823 first observed.

Chemistry

• June 17 - Charles Macintosh patents a method of rubberizing fabric to waterproof it.^[1]

Exploration

• February 20 - James Weddell's expedition to Antarctica reaches latitude 74 15' S and longitude 34 16'45" W, the most southerly position that will be attained for more than 80 years.

Medicine

• October 5 - The Lancet founded by Thomas Wakley.
• Theodric Romeyn Beck publishes the first significant American book on forensic medicine, Elements of Medical Jurisprudence in Albany, New York.

Paleontology

• January - In a cave on the Gower Peninsula of Wales, William Buckland discovers the "Red Lady of Paviland", the first identification of a prehistoric (male) human burial. The bones are discovered with those of the woolly mammoth, proving that the two had coexisted.^[2]

Physics

• William Sturgeon invents the electromagnet.

Technology

• First use of a Fresnel lens in a lighthouse optic, at the Cordouan lighthouse on the Gironde estuary.^[3]
• First permanent wire cable suspension bridge, Pont Saint Antoine in Geneva, by Guillaume Henri Dufour, of two 40 m spans.^[4]
• French officer Henri-Joseph Paixhans develops the Paixhans gun, the first naval artillery to fire explosive shells.

Awards

• Copley Medal: John Pond

Births

• January 8 - Alfred Russel Wallace (died 1913), British naturalist who devises the theory of natural selection at the same time as Charles Darwin.
• February 3 - Spencer Fullerton Baird (died 1887), American ornithologist and ichthyologist.
• December 22 - Jean Henri Fabre (died 1915), French entomologist.

Deaths

• January 26 - Edward Jenner (born 1749), English inventor of the vaccine.
• September 23 - Matthew Baillie (born 1761), British pathologist

References

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