In 1984, during Super Bowl XVIII, Apple’s iconic ‘1984’ commercial aired. Apple became a household name in the third quarter of Super Bowl XVIII when it aired the enormously popular 1984 ad promoting the upcoming release of the Macintosh. Arguably the most famous Super […]
In 1979, Neptune became the outermost planet as Pluto moved closer to the Sun. Back in the days when Pluto was still a planet, Neptune began a 20-year run as the outermost planet in the solar system as Pluto’s elliptical orbit carried it closer in
In 1997, Comet Hale-Bopp crossed Mars’ orbit . The comet is named for its discoverers. On July 23, 1995, an unusually bright comet outside of Jupiter’s orbit was discovered independently by Alan Hale, New Mexico and Thomas Bopp, Arizona. Learn more at http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/halebopp.html
Apple held their much-anticipated education event today in New York City. They are targeting the K-12 market with a couple of initiatives. The first initiative is iBooks 2, where textbooks will now be available alongside the rest of Apple’s ebook offerings. They have partnered
In 1736, James Watt, the inventor of the steam engine, was born. The discovery that steam could be harnessed and made to work is not credited to James Watt. In fact, the ancient Greeks had crude steam engines. James Watt, however, is credited with inventing
In 1989, astronomers discovered pulsar in remnants of Supernova 1987A. It was the first supernova seen in 1987, so it was officially dubbed Supernova 1987A, or SN87A for short. The star that blew up (Sanduleak -69 202) was the first blue supergiant ever seen to
In 1968, Soyuz 4 and 5 completed the first docking of two manned spacecraft. Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 carried out the original mission of the first Soyuz mission in 1967 — docking between two manned spacecraft and transfer of crew members between the crafts.
In 1967, Robert J Van De Graaff, U.S. nuclear physicist, died at age 65. He developed a high-voltage electrostatic generator (later called the Van de Graaff generator). You’ll remember it from your local science museum. It is the metal ball that you put your hands
In 1850, mathematician Sonya Kurtovsky Kovalevsky was born. She faced much discrimination as a woman in the field of mathematics. Her greatest success in mathematics occurred in 1888 when she won the Prix Bordin of the French Academy of Sciences for her paper On the
In 1742, Edmond Halley died at age 85. Using Isaac Newton’s new Laws of Motion, Edmond Halley made a prediction in 1705 that a comet which had appeared in 1531, 1607 and 1682 would reappear in 1758. He didn’t live to see its return. The
In 1989, hundreds of IBM computers across Britain were hit by the “Friday the 13th” virus. The virus wiped out program files and caused considerable anxiety at a time when large-scale computer viruses were a relatively new threat. Learn more at http://articles.latimes.com/1989-01-13/news/mn-402_1_computer-virus
In 1853, Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro, an Italian mathematician, was born. He was instrumental in the development of absolute differential calculus, formerly called the Ricci calculus, but now known as tensor analysis. Learn more at http://www.gap-system.org/~history/Biographies/Ricci-Curbastro.html In 2001, William Hewlett died at age 87. William Hewlett and
According to Macworld, Apple has announced an education-related event for later this month. This is not unexpected as it had been widely speculated that such an event would occur. The event will take place on January 19th at 10:00 AM EST at the Solomon R.
In 1997, the Telstar 401 satellite failed due to an electric discharge during a geomagnetic storm. Telstar 401 was the first of AT&T’s next generation of video- and data-communications satellites. Learn more at http://sirius-c.ncat.edu/space/Space-Weather/poetry/storm1/t401lau2.html
