Famous Scientists And Mathematicians Quiz

Answer: Astronomy

As a tribute to his achievements in electricity and magnetism, the unit of current is named after him - 'Ampere' or 'Amp'.

Answer: True

Archimedes was a great mathematician too. He did a great deal of work on simple machines. He devised the formulae for levers and pulleys. He was practical and wanted to put his ideas to the test. He arranged a giant system of pulleys and connected one end to the front of a ship. With the other end he was supposed to pull. Archimedes calculated that when he pulled, he would exert a pulling force equal to about one-three hundredth of the original force. And lo and behold! He pulled the loaded ship with a single hand!

Answer: Galileo Galilei

He did what almost all the present amateur astronomers do - project the image of the sun onto a white sheet of paper. He described the phases of the moon and the sunspots in his book 'The Starry Messenger'.

Answer: Invention of even roots of negative numbers

His achievements and observations in trigonometry, algebra, arithmetic and astronomy are recorded in his famous book, 'Aryabhatiya'. He was also among the first people to propose the Heliocentric form of the solar system(ie,with the sun as the centre).

Answer: Uranium

Becquerel discovered radioactivity in uranium almost by chance, while investigating the X-rays produced by fluorescent crystals. He left a uranium salt in a drawer containing photographic paper, and later found that some form of radiation had clouded the paper.

Answer: True

Among his other contributions and achievements was the invention of the set of integers, rules for carrying out arithmetic operations with zero and negative numbers, indeterminate equations and geometric problems and formulae concerning areas and volumes.

Answer: Thomas Newcommen

Actually it was Thomas Newcommen who first invented the steam engine. But it was very inefficient, having an efficiency of about only one percent! James Watt modified the Newcommen engine and was able to increase its efficiency to about 2 to 4 percent.

The impact of even such a marginal increase was so great that it gave Watt everlasting fame and he came to be known as the inventor of the steam engine. Otto and Diesel invented the petrol and diesel engines, respectively.

Answer: Henry Cavendish

This find enabled him to propose the first figures for the mass and density of the Earth. Sir Newton formulated the force of gravitation but didn't find out the value of G.

Answer: Maria Sklodowska

She coined the term 'radioactivity'. She and her husband, Pierre isolated Radium and Polonium. She was the first person to recieve two Nobel Prizes - one in Physics (1903) and one in Chemistry (1911).

Answer: Darwin

This book provoked much controversy in the world of biology. But now, his theory of 'Evolution by Natural Selection' is recognized as one of the greatest discoveries in the history of science. Often, it is simplified as 'Survival of the Fittest'.

Answer: Time on the rocket seems to pass more slowly

The observations made from the earth would be as follows - 1) Time on the rocket seems to pass more slowly. 2) Rocket appears to decrease in length. 3) Rocket appears to increase in mass. In 1976, scientists at CERN fired a beam of muons at about 99 percent the speed of light. Muons are particles that have a very small half-life(about 2 millionths of a second).

But at this speed, their half-life period increased by about 30 times! This is definitely an evidence for the first observation. The phenomenon of Lorentz Contraction accounts for the decrease in length of the body travelling close to the speed of light by a variable known as the 'Lorentz Factor'. Einstein's famous mass-energy equation proves the increase in mass of a body as its velocity and therefore its Kinetic Energy increases.

Answer: Chadwick

Electrons were discovered by J.J.Thomson in 1880. Rutherford concluded(from his famous Aplha-particle - Gold foil Experiment) that an atom has a tiny, but heavy centre which he called nucleus. Protons were discovered by Goldstein in 1886. Neutrons were discovered by Chadwick in 1932.

Answer: He became the President of the London Royal Society

Faraday was one of the greatest scientists of all times. But he was remarkably modest and refused the Knighthood offered by the Queen and the Presidentship of the Royal Society of London. Among his other achievements were the discovery of the famous principles of the Electric Motor and Electromagnetic Induction.

He also discovered Benzene and developed the Theory of Magnetic Lines of Force.

Answer: Enrico Fermi

The class of sub-atomic particles - Fermions and the element - Fermium. Fermi also did due research on nuclear energy and was a major scientist involved in the development of the atomic bomb for the USA. Einstein has an element named after him - Einsteinium and Bose has a class of fundamental particles named after him - bosons.

Answer: Benjamin Franklin

Many people remember Benjamin Franklin as a writer, statesman and patriot who did much to establish the United States of America. Franklin, however, was also a notable scientist who carried out important experiments in electricity, and the inventor of the lightning rod and a stove that is still in use today.

He also introduced the use of the electrical terms 'positive' and 'negative.' In his most famous experiment, Franklin showed that lightning was the same form of energy as static electricity. He did this by flying a kite in a thunderstorm.

He put his finger near a key attached to the metal kite string, and a spark jumped between them.