1844 in science

The year 1844 in science and technology included many events, some of which are listed here.

See also: 1843 in science, other events of 1844, 1845 in science and the list of years in science.

Astronomy

• Friedrich Bessel explains the wobbling motions of Sirius and Procyon by suggesting that these stars have dark companions

Biology

• Gabriel Gustav Valentin notes the digestive activity of pancreatic juice

Chemistry

• Karl Klaus discovers ruthenium

Mathematics

• Joseph Liouville finds the first transcendental number
• Hermann Grassmann studys vectors with more than three dimensions

Technology

• May 11 - Samuel Morse send the first message using Morse code
• William Fox Talbot publishes the first photographic book, The Pencil of Nature

Awards

• Copley Medal: Carlo Matteucci
• Wollaston Medal for Geology: William Conybeare

Births

• March 25 - Adolf Engler, German botanist († 1930)
• April 20 - Ludwig Boltzmann, Austrian physicist famous for the invention of statistical mechanics († 1906)
• August 6 - James Henry Greathead, British civil engineer († 1896)
• August 13 - Friedrich Miescher, Swiss biologist († 1895)
• August 22 - George Washington DeLong, Arctic explorer († 1881)
• October 3 - Sir Patrick Manson, Scottish parasitologist, the "father of tropical medicine" († 1922)
• November 25 - Karl Benz, German automobile engineer († 1929)

Deaths

• June 19 - Etienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, French naturalist (* 1772)
• July 27 - John Dalton, English chemist and physicist (* 1766)
• August 30 - Francis Baily, English astronomer (* 1774)
• December 28 - Thomas Henderson, Scottish astronomer (* 1798)