Portal:History of science/Selected anniversaries/January 12

January 12:

 * 1577 - Birth of Jan Baptist van Helmont, Flemish chemist (d. 1644)
 * 1665 - Death of Pierre de Fermat, French mathematician and lawyer (b. 1601)
 * 1792 - Birth of Johan August Arfwedson, Swedish chemist (d. 1841)
 * 1808 - The organizational meeting that led to the creation of the Wernerian Natural History Society, a former Scottish learned society, is held in Edinburgh
 * 1895 - The National Trust is founded in Britain
 * 1899 - Birth of Paul Hermann Müller, Swiss chemist, Nobel laureate (d. 1965)
 * 1903 - Birth of Igor Kurchatov, Russian physicist (d. 1960)
 * 1909 - Death of Hermann Minkowski, German mathematician (b. 1864)
 * 1949 - Birth of Michael W. Vannier, American radiologist
 * 1967 - Dr. James Bedford becomes the first person to be cryonically preserved with intent of future resuscitation
 * 1996 - Death of Joachim Nitsche, German mathematician (b. 1926)
 * 2003 - Death of Alan Nunn May, English physicist and Soviet spy (b. 1911)
 * 2004 - Death of Olga Ladyzhenskaya, Russian mathematician (b. 1921)
 * 2007 - Comet McNaught reaches perihelion becoming the brightest comet in more than 40 years