The year 1878 in science and technology involved many significant events, listed below.

Astronomy

• English astronomer Richard A. Proctor describes the Zone of Avoidance, the area of the night sky that is obscured by our own galaxy, for the first time.

Biology

• Death of last confirmed Cape Lion.^[1]

Conservation

• An Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom places Epping Forest in the care of the City of London Corporation to remain unenclosed.

Exploration

• June 22 - Adolf Erik Nordenski ld sets out on the year-long first navigation of the Northern Sea Route, the shipping lane from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean along the Siberian coast.

August - Cleopatra's Needle (horizontal) being raised in London.

Geology

• Clarence King publishes Systematic Geology.
• Charles Lapworth publishes his analysis of the change in graptolite fossils through sequences of exposed shales in southern Scotland, establishing the importance of using graptolites to understand stratigraphic sequences.^[2]

Medicine

• d m Politzer publishes Lehrbuch der Ohrenheilkunde, a major otology textbook.^[3]
• Dentists Act in the United Kingdom limits the title of "dentist" and "dental surgeon" to qualified and registered practitioners.^[4]

Meteorology

• February 11 - The first weekly weather report is published in the United Kingdom.

Paleontology

• 31 Iguanodon skeletons are discovered in a coal mine at Bernissart, Belgium.

Technology

• February 19 - The phonograph is patented by Thomas Edison.
• October 14 - The world's first recorded floodlit football fixture is played at Bramall Lane in Sheffield.
• August - Cleopatra's Needle is raised onto its base in London.
• December 18 - Joseph Swan of Newcastle upon Tyne in England announces his invention of an incandescent light bulb.^[5]
• December 31 - Karl Benz produces a two-stroke gas engine.
• William Crookes invents the Crookes tube which produces cathode rays.^[6]
• Lester Allan Pelton produces the first operational Pelton wheel.^[7]

Institutions

• October 1 - Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University opens as Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College in the United States.

Awards

• Copley Medal: Jean Baptiste Boussingault
• Wollaston Medal for Geology: Thomas Wright

Births

• January 1 - A. K. Erlang, Danish mathematician (died 1929)
• January 7 - Samuel James Cameron, Scottish obstetrician (died 1959)
• January 25 - Ernst Alexanderson, Swedish-born television pioneer (died 1975)
• February 5 - Andr Citro n, French automobile manufacturer (died 1935)
• February 8 - Martin Buber, Austrian philosopher (died 1965)
• February 28 - Pierre Fatou, French mathematician (died 1929)
• March 4 - Peter D. Ouspensky, Russian philosopher (died 1947)
• April 16 - Owen Thomas Jones, Welsh geologist (died 1967)
• May 3 - Cruz Hern ndez, El Salvadorian oldest person (not fully verified) (died 2007)
• June 3 - Barney Oldfield, American automobile racer and pioneer (died 1946)
• June 12 - James Oliver Curwood, American novelist and conservationist (died 1927)
• July 12 - Peeter P ld, Estonian politician and pedagogical scientist (died 1930)
• August 28 - George Whipple, American winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (died 1976)
• September 5 - Robert von Lieben, Austrian physicist (died 1913)
• September 13 - Matilde Moisant, American pilot (died 1964)
• November 26 - Marshall "Major" Taylor, American cyclist (died 1932)
• December 25 - Louis Chevrolet, Swiss-born race driver and automobile builder (died 1941)
• December 25 - Joseph Schenck, Russian-born film executive (died 1962)

Deaths

• January 18 - William Stokes, Irish physician (born 1804)
• January 18 - Antoine C sar Becquerel, French scientist (born 1788)
• January 19 - Henri Victor Regnault, French physical chemist (born 1810)
• February 8 - Elias Magnus Fries, Swedish botanist (born 1794)
• February 10 - Claude Bernard, French physiologist (born 1813)
• February 26 - Angelo Secchi, Italian astronomer (born 1818)
• March 16 - William Banting, English undertaker and dietician (b. c.1796)
• May 13 - Joseph Henry, American physicist (born 1797)
• June 6 - Robert Stirling, Scottish clergyman and inventor (born 1790)
• July 23 - Baron Carl von Rokitansky, Bohemian pathologist (born 1804)

References

fr:1878 en science mk:1878 no:Vitenskaps ret 1878 nn:Vitskap i 1878 pt:1878 na ci ncia sv:Vetenskaps ret 1878