History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.

html

You are here: Home page > Science and technology timeline

Home
A-Z index
Get the book
Follow us
Random article
Timeline
Teaching guide
About us
Privacy policy

Advertisement

Technology timeline
Like 190

Tweet

by Chris Woodford. Last updated: September 9, 2015.

Inventions don't generally happen by accident or in a random order: science and technology progress in a
very logical way, with each new discovery leading on from the last. You can see that in our mini
chronology of invention, below. It's not a complete history of everything; it's simply another way to

1 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

explore the 450 or so detailed articles on our website.

Not all of our articles are listed in the timeline; you can find a more complete list in our A-Z index.

Articles on Explain
Date Invention or discovery
that stuff

4–5 billion Solar cells

Sun starts to produce energy.
years ago Energy

10 million Humans make the first tools from stone, wood, antlers, and
Tools and machines
years ago. bones.

Biofuels
1–2 million Candles
Humans discover fire.
years ago Car engines
Jet engines

25,000–
Humans first wear clothes. Biomimetic clothing
50,000 BCE
10,000 BCE Earliest boats are constructed. Ships and boats
8000– 9000 Biofuels
Beginnings of human settlements and agriculture.
BCE Water
6000– 7000
Hand-made bricks first used for construction in the Middle East. Bricks
BCE
4000 BCE Iron used for the first time in decorative ornaments. Iron and steel
Tools and machines
3500 BCE Humans invent the wheel.
Wheels and axles
c1700 BCE Semites of the Mediterranean develop the alphabet. Digital pens
Ancient societies invent some of the first machines for moving Tools and machines
0– 1500 BCE
water and agriculture. Water
Iron Age begins: iron is widely used for making tools and
1000 BCE Iron and steel
weapons in many parts of the world.

Electricity
600 BCE Thales of Miletus discovers static electricity.
Static electricity

c.150– 100 First gear-driven, precision clockwork machine (the Antikythera

Clockwork
BCE mechanism) is developed.
Roman engineer Vitruvius perfects the modern, vertical water
c.50 BCE Turbines
wheel.

62 CE Hero of Alexandria, a Greek scientist, pioneers steam power. Steam engines

105 CE Ts'ai Lun makes the first paper in China. Paper

27 BCE–395
Romans develop the first, basic concrete called pozzolana. Steel and concrete
CE

2 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

~600 CE Windmills are invented in the Middle East. Wind turbines

Bullets
700– 900 CE Chinese invent gunpowder and fireworks.
Fireworks
Chinese develop eyeglasses by fixing lenses to frames that fit
1000 CE ?? Lenses
onto people's faces.
Johannes Gutenberg pioneers the modern printing press, using
1450 Printing
rearrangeable metal letters called movable type.
1470s The first parachute is sketched on paper by an unknown inventor. Parachutes
Gerardus Mercator helps to revolutionize navigation with better
1530s Satellite navigation
mapmaking.
A Dutch spectacle maker named Zacharias Janssen makes the Microscopes
1590
first compound microscope. Electron microscopes
~1600 Galileo Galilei designs a basic thermometer. Thermometer
Antoni van Leeuwenhoek and Robert Hooke independently Microscopes
16th century
develop microscopes. Electron microscopes
William Gilbert publishes his great book De Magnete describing
1600 how Earth behaves like a giant magnet. It's the beginning of the Magnetism
scientific study of magnetism.
Galileo Galilei builds a practical telescope and makes new
1609 Space telescopes
astronomical discoveries.
Galileo's pupil Evangelista Torricelli builds the first mercury
1643 Barometers
barometer for measuring air pressure.
Christiaan Huygens develops the pendulum clock (using
1650s Galileo's earlier discovery that a swinging pendulum can be used Pendulum clocks
to keep time).
1687 Isaac Newton formulates his three laws of motion. Motion
1700s Bartolomeo Cristofori invents the piano. Pianos
English farmer Jethro Tull begins the mechanization of
1701 Tractors
agriculture by inventing the horse-drawn seed drill.
Gottfried Leibniz pioneers the binary number system now used How computers work
1703
in virtually all computers. History of computers

Thomas Newcomen builds the first practical (but stationary)

1712 Steam engines
steam engine.

Christiaan Huygens conceives the internal combustion engine,

1700s Car engines
but never actually builds one.
William Champion develops a commercially viable process for
1737 Zinc
extracting zinc on a large scale.
John Campbell invents the sextant, an improved navigational
1757 Satellite navigation
device that enables sailors to measure latitude.
John Harrison develops reliable chronometers (seafaring clocks) Quartz clocks and
1730s– 1770s that allow sailors to measure longitude accurately for the first watches
time. Satellite navigation
1751 Axel Cronstedt isolates nickel. Nickel

3 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

Axel Cronstedt notices steam when he boils a rock—and

1756 Zeolites
discovers zeolites.
Wolfgang von Kempelen develops a mechanical speaking
1769 Speech synthesizers
machine: the world's first speech synthesizer.
Abraham Darby III builds a pioneering iron bridge at a place
1770s Bridges
now called Ironbridge in England.
~1780 Josiah Wedgwood (or Thomas Massey) invents the pyrometer. Pyrometers
French Brothers Joseph-Michel Montgolfier and Jacques-Étienne
1783 Hot-air balloons
Montgolfier make the first practical hot-air balloon.
Italian Alessandro Volta makes the first battery (known as a Electricity
1800
Voltaic pile). Batteries
Joseph-Marie Jacquard invents the automated cloth-weaving
1801 loom. The punched cards it uses to store patterns help to inspire History of computers
programmable computers.
1803 Henry and Sealy Fourdrinier develop the papermaking machine. Paper
Humphry Davy develops electrolysis into an important chemical
1806 Electrolyzers
technique and uses it to identify a number of new elements.
1807 Humphry Davy develops the electric arc lamp. Xenon lamps
1814 George Stephenson builds the first practical steam locomotive.
Steam engines
1816 Robert Stirling invents the efficient Stirling engine. Stirling engines
Electricity generators
1820s– 1830s Michael Faraday builds primitive electric generators and motors. Electric motors
Hub motors
Photography
1827 Joseph Niepce makes the first modern photograph.
Digital cameras
Electric motors
1830s William Sturgeon develops the first practical electric motor.
Hub motors
Louis Daguerre invents a practical method of taking pin-sharp Digital cameras
1830s
photographs called Daguerreotypes. Photography
William Henry Fox Talbot develops a way of making and Digital cameras
1830s
printing photographs using reverse images called negatives. Photography
Charles Wheatstone and William Cooke, in England, and Samuel
1830s– 1840s Morse, in the United States, develop the electric telegraph (a Telephones
forerunner of the telephone).
Englishman Francis Petit-Smith and Swedish-American John
1836 Propellers
Ericsson independently develop propellers with blades for ships.
Charles Goodyear finally perfects a durable form of rubber
1839 (vulcanized rubber) after many years of unsuccessful Rubber
experimenting.
Energy
Scottish physicist James Prescott Joule outlines the theory of the
1840s Great physics
conservation of energy.
experiments
Scotsman Alexander Bain invents a primitive fax machine based
1840s Fax machines
on chemical technology.
James Francis invents a water turbine now used in many of the Turbines
1849
world's hydropower plants. Water

4 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

Henry Bessemer pioneers a new method of making steel in large

1850s Iron and steel
quantities.
Louis Pasteur develops pasteurization: a way of preserving food
1850s Pasteurization
by heating it to kill off bacteria.
Italian Giovanni Caselli develops a mechanical fax machine
1850s Fax machines
called the pantelegraph.
Frenchman Étienne Lenoir and German Nikolaus Otto pioneer Car engines
1860s
the internal combustion engine. Cars, history of
James Clerk Maxwell figures out that radio waves must exist and
1860s Radio
sets out basic laws of electromagnetism.
1860s Fire extinguishers are invented. Fire extinguisher
1861 Elisha Graves Otis invents the elevator with built-in safety brake. Elevators
1867 Joseph Monier invents reinforced concrete. Reinforced concrete
Christopher Latham Sholes invents the modern typewriter and
1868 Typewriters
QWERTY keyboard.
Alexander Graham Bell patents the telephone, though the true
1876 Telephones
ownership of the invention remains controversial even today.
Thomas Edison develops the phonograph, the first practical CD players
1870s
method of recording and playing back sound on metal foil. MP3 players
Lester Pelton invents a useful new kind of water turbine known
1870s Turbines
as a Pelton wheel.
Thomas Edison invents his sound-recording machine or Record players
1877
phonograph—a forerunner of the record player and CD player. Sound
Edward Very invents the flare gun (Very pistol) for sending
1877 Flares
distress flares at sea.
1880 Thomas Edison patents the modern incandescent electric lamp. Incandescent lamps
1880 Pierre and Paul-Jacques Curie discover the piezoelectric effect. Piezoelectricity
1880s Thomas Edison opens the world's first power plants. Power plants
Charles Chamberland invents the autoclave (steam sterilizing
1880s Autoclaves
machine).
Charles and Julia Hall and Paul Heroult independently develop
1880s Aluminum
an affordable way of making aluminum.
Copper
Carrie Everson invents new ways of mining silver, gold, and
1880s Gold
copper.
Silver
Jacques d'Arsonval suggests heat energy could be extracted from OTEC (Ocean Thermal
1881
the oceans. Energy Conversion)
Digital cameras
1883 Charles Eastman invents plastic photographic film.
Plastics
Steam turbines
1884 Charles Parsons develops the steam turbine.
Turbines
1885 Karl Benz builds a gasoline-engined car. Car engines
1886 Josephine Cochran invents the dishwasher. Dishwashers
LCD screens and
1888 Friedrich Reinitzer discovers liquid crystals.
displays

5 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

Electricity
Nikola Tesla patents the alternating current (AC) electric
Electric motors
1888 induction motor and, in opposition to Thomas Edison, becomes a
Induction motors
staunch advocate of AC power.
Power plants
Everett F. Morse invents the optical pyrometer for measuring
1899 Pyrometers
temperatures at a safe distance.
French brothers Joseph and Louis Lumiere invent movie Camcorders
1890s
projectors and open the first movie theater. Projection TV
German engineer Rudolf Diesel develops his diesel engine—a
1890s more efficient internal combustion engine without a sparking Diesel engines
plug.
1895 German physicist Wilhelm Röntgen discovers X rays. X rays
1895 American Ogden Bolton, Jr. invents the electric bicycle. Electric bikes
Guglielmo Marconi sends radio-wave signals across the Atlantic
1901 Radio
Ocean from England to Canada
1901 The first electric vacuum cleaner is developed. Vacuum cleaners
Brothers Wilbur and Orville Wright build the first engine- Airplanes
1903
powered airplane. Jet engines
1905 Albert Einstein explains the photoelectric effect. Photoelectric cells
1905 Samuel J. Bens invents the chainsaw. Chainsaws
1906 Willis Carrier pioneers the air conditioner. Air conditioners
1906 Mikhail Tswett discovers chromatography. Chromatography
Leo Baekeland develops Bakelite, the first popular synthetic
1907 Plastics
plastic.
1907 Alva Fisher invents the electric clothes washer. Clothes washer
Air pollution
Frederick Gardner Cottrell develops the electrostatic smoke
1906-8 Electrostatic smoke
precipitator (smokestack pollution scrubber).
precipitators
American industrialist and engineer Henry Ford launches the Car engines
1908
Ford Model T, the world's first truly affordable car. Cars, history of
German chemists Fritz Haber and Zygmunt Klemensiewicz
1909 develop the glass electrode, enabling very precise measurements pH meters
of acidity.
American chemist Gilbert Lewis describes the basic chemistry
that leads to practical, lithium-ion rechargeable batteries (though
1912 Lithium-ion batteries
they don't appear in a practical, commercial form until the
1990s).
Hans Geiger develops the Geiger counter, a detector for
1912 Geiger counters
radioactivity.
Francis Aston pioneers the mass spectrometer and uses it to
1919 Mass spectrometers
discover many isotopes.
Television
1920s John Logie Baird develops mechanical television.
LCD TV
Television
1920s Philo T. Farnsworth invents modern electronic television.
LCD TV

6 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

Robert H. Goddard develops the principle of the modern, liquid- Bullets

1920s
fueled space rocket. Space rockets
German engineer Gustav Tauschek and American Paul Handel
1920s independently develop primitive optical character recognition OCR
(OCR) scanning systems.
Albert W. Hull invents the magnetron, a device that can generate Magnetrons
1920s
microwaves from electricity. Microwave ovens
Karel Capek and his brother coin the word "robot" in a play
1921 Robots
about artificial humans.
1921 John Larson develops the polygraph ("lie detector") machine. Polygraphs
Thomas Midgley, Jr. invents coolant chemicals for air Air conditioners
1928
conditioners and refrigerators. Refrigerators
1928 The electric refrigerator is invented. Refrigerators
Television
1930s Peter Goldmark pioneers color television.
LCD TV
1930s Laszlo and Georg Biro pioneer the modern ballpoint pen. Digital pens
Eco homes
1930s Maria Telkes creates the first solar-powered house.
Solar cells
Kevlar
Wallace Carothers develops neoprene (synthetic rubber used in Nomex
1930s
wetsuits) and nylon, the first popular synthetic clothing material. Nylon
Wetsuits
1930s Robert Watson Watt oversees the development of radar. Radar
1930s Arnold Beckman develops the electronic pH meter. pH meters
Harold E. Edgerton invents the xenon flash lamp for high-speed
1931 Xenon lamps
photography.
Arne Olander discovers the shape memory effect in a
1932 Shape memory alloys
gold-cadmium alloy.
1936 W.B. Elwood invents the magnetic reed switch. Reed switches
Chester Carlson invents the principle of photocopying
1938 Photocopiers
(xerography).
Roy Plunkett accidentally invents a nonstick plastic coating Gore-Tex
1938
called Teflon. Nonstick pans
1939 Igor Sikorsky builds the first truly practical helicopter. Helicopters
English physicists John Randall and Harry Boot develop a Magnetrons
1940s
compact magnetron for use in airplane radar navigation systems. Radar
Enrico Fermi builds the first nuclear chain reactor at the
1942 Nuclear power
University of Chicago.
US government scientist Vannevar Bush proposes a kind of
desk-sized memory store called Memex, which has some of the Electronic books
1945
features later incorporated into electronic books and the World World Wide Web
Wide Web (WWW).
Amplifiers
John Bardeen, Walter Brattain, and William Shockley invent the
Electronics
1947 transistor, which allows electronic equipment to made much
History of computers
smaller and leads to the modern computer revolution.
Transistors

7 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

Bernard Silver and N. Joseph Woodland patent barcodes

Barcodes and barcode
1949 —striped patterns that are initially developed for marking
scanners
products in grocery stores.
Charles Townes and Arthur Schawlow invent the maser
1950s (microwave laser). Gordon Gould coins the word "laser" and Lasers
builds the first optical laser in 1958.
Batteries
Stanford Ovshinksy develops various technologies that make
Electric bicycles
1950s renewable energy more practical, including practical solar cells
Electric cars
and improved rechargeable batteries.
Solar cells
European bus companies experiment with using flywheels as
1950s Flywheels
regenerative brakes
Percy Spencer accidentally discovers how to cook with
1950s Microwave ovens
microwaves, inadvertently inventing the microwave oven.
Fiber optics
1954 Indian physicist Narinder Kapany pioneers fiber optics.
Endoscopes
First commercial nuclear power is produced at Calder Hall,
1956 Nuclear power plants
Cumbria, England.
Soviet Union (Russia and her allies) launch the Sputnik space
1957 Satellites
satellite.
Lawrence Curtiss, Basil Hirschowitz, and Wilbur Peters build the
1957 Endoscopes
first fiber-optic gastroscope.
History of computers
Jack Kilby and Robert Noyce, working independently, develop
1958 integrated circuits
the integrated circuit.
Transistors
IBM and General Motors develop Design Augmented by
1959 Computers-1 (DAC-1), the first computer-aided design (CAD) Computer graphics
system.
1960s Joseph-Armand Bombardier perfects his Ski-Doo® snowmobile. Snowmobiles
1960 Theodore Maiman invents the ruby laser. Lasers
William Armistead and S. Donald Stookey of Corning Glass
1962 Photochromic lenses
Works invent light-sensitive (photochromic) glass.
Ivan Sutherland develops Sketchpad, one of the first
1963 Computer graphics
computer-aided design programs.
IBM helps to pioneer e-commerce with an airline ticket
1964 E-commerce
reservation system called SABRE.
Frank Pantridge develops the portable defibrillator for treating
1965 Defibrillators
cardiac arrest patients.
1966 Stephanie Kwolek patents a super-strong plastic called Kevlar. Kevlar
Japanese company Noritake invents the vacuum fluorescent Vacuum fluorescent
1967
display (VFD). displays
Alfred Y. Cho and John R. Arthur, Jr invent a precise way of Molecular beam
1968
making single crystals called molecular beam epitaxy (MBE). epitaxy
Solar cells
1969 World's first solar power station opened in France.
Energy

8 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

Long before computers become portable, Alan Kay imagines

1969 Electronic books
building an electronic book, which he nicknames the Dynabook.
Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith invent the CCD (charge-
CCDs
1969 coupled device): the light-sensitive chip used in digital cameras,
Digital cameras
webcams, and other modern optical equipment.
1969 Astronauts walk on the Moon. Space rockets
1960s Douglas Engelbart develops the computer mouse. Computer mouse
1960s James Russell invents compact discs. CD players
Electronic ink and
1971 Electronic ink is pioneered by Nick Sheridon at Xerox PARC.
paper
1971 Ted Hoff builds the first single-chip computer or microprocessor. History of computers
Martin Cooper develops the first handheld cellphone (mobile
1973 Cellphones
phone).
Robert Metcalfe figures out a simple way of linking computers
Computer networks
1973 together that he names Ethernet. Most computers hooked up to
Internet
the Internet now use it.
Barcodes and barcode
1974 First grocery-store purchase of an item coded with a barcode.
scanners
Whitfield Diffie and Martin Hellman invent public-key
1975 Encryption
cryptography.
1975 Pico Electronics develops X-10 home automation system. Smart homes
Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs launch the Apple I: one of the
1976 History of computers
world's first personal home computers
1970s– 1980s James Dyson invents the bagless, cyclonic vacuum cleaner. Vacuum cleaners
Scientists including Charles Bennett, Paul Benioff, Richard
1970s-1980s Feynman, and David Deutsch sketch out how quantum Quantum computers
computers might work.
Japanese electrical pioneer Akio Morita develops the Sony CD players
1980s
Walkman, the first truly portable player for recorded music. MP3 players
Stung by Apple's success, IBM releases its own affordable
1981 History of computers
personal computer (PC).
1981 The Space Shuttle makes its maiden voyage. Space Shuttle
1981 Patricia Bath develops laser eye surgery for removing cataracts. Lasers
Alexei Ekimov and Louis E. Brus (independently) discover
1981– 1982 Quantum dots
quantum dots.
Compact discs (CDs) are launched as a new way to store music
1983 CD players
by the Sony and Philips corporations.
Larry Hornbeck, working at Texas Instruments, develops DLP®
1987 DLP® projectors
projection—now used in many projection TV systems.
Internet
1989 Tim Berners-Lee invents the World Wide Web.
World Wide Web
Radio-controlled
German watchmaking company Junghans introduces the MEGA clocks
1990
1, believed to be the world's first radio-controlled wristwatch. Quartz clocks and
watches

9 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

Linus Torvalds creates the first version of Linux, a Computers

1991
collaboratively written computer operating system. Linux
American-born mathematician John Daugman perfects the
1994 Iris scans
mathematics that make iris scanning systems possible.
Israeli computer scientists Alon Cohen and Lior Haramaty invent
1994 VoIP
VoIP for sending telephone calls over the Internet.
Broadcast.com becomes one of the world's first online radio
1995 Streaming media
stations.
1995 Pierre Omidyar launches the eBay auction website. E-commerce
WRAL-HD broadcasts the first high-definition television
1996 HDTV
(HDTV) signal in the United States.
Electronics companies agree to make Wi-Fi a worldwide
1997 Wireless Internet
standard for wireless Internet.
Apple revolutionizes music listening by unveiling its iPod MP3
2001 MP3 players
music player.
Energy-absorbing
2001 Richard Palmer develops energy-absorbing D3O plastic.
materials
The Wikipedia online encyclopedia is founded by Larry Sanger
2001 Electronic books
and Jimmy Wales.
BitTorrent
2001 Bram Cohen develops BitTorrent file-sharing.
Internet
Scott White, Nancy Sottos, and colleagues develop self-healing
2001 Self-healing materials
materials.
iRobot Corporation releases the first version of its Roomba® Roomba
2002
vacuum cleaning robot. Robots
Electronic voting plays a major part in a controversial US
2004 Touchscreens
Presidential Election.
2004 Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov discover graphene. Graphene
A pioneering low-cost laptop for developing countries called
2005 OLPC is announced by MIT computing pioneer Nicholas Computers
Negroponte.
Amazon.com launches its Kindle electronic book (e-book)
2007 Electronic books
reader.
Cellphones
2007 Apple introduces a touchscreen cellphone called the iPhone.
Touchscreens
Computers
2010 Apple releases its touchscreen tablet computer, the iPad.
Touchscreens
3D Television
2010 3D TV starts to become more widely available.
Television
Elon Musk announces "hyperloop"—a giant, pneumatic tube Pneumatic transport
2013
transport system. tube
Supercomputers (the world's fastest computers) are now a mere
2015 Supercomputers
30 times less powerful than human brains.

Like 190

10 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

Tweet

Sponsored links

If you liked this article...

You might like my new book, Atoms Under the Floorboards: The Surprising Science Hidden in Your
Home, published worldwide by Bloomsbury.

Please do NOT copy our articles onto blogs and other websites

Text copyright © Chris Woodford 2008, 2011. All rights reserved. Full copyright notice and terms of use.

Follow us

Rate this page

Please rate or give feedback on this page and I will make a donation to WaterAid.

Save or share this page

Press CTRL + D to bookmark this page for later or tell your friends about it with:

11 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17
History of invention: A science and technology timeline http://www.explainthatstuff.com/timeline.html

Cite this page

Woodford, Chris. (2008/2011) Technology timeline. Retrieved from http://www.explainthatstuff.com
/timeline.html. [Accessed (Insert date here)]

More to explore on our website...

Communications
Computers
Electricity & electronics
Energy
Engineering
Environment

Gadgets
Home life
Materials
Science
Tools & instruments
Transportation

Home
A-Z index
Get the book
Follow us
Random article
Timeline
Teaching guide
About us

↑ Back to top

12 of 12 25-05-2016 19:17