Timeline of Electromagnetism and Classical Optics - 18th Century

18th Century

• 1704 — Isaac Newton publishes Opticks, a corpuscular theory of light and colour
• 1728 — James Bradley discovers the aberration of starlight and uses it to determine that the speed of light is about 283,000 km/s
• 1729 — Stephen Gray demonstrates the difference between conductors and non-conductors (insulators).
• 1732 — C.F. du Fay Shows that all objects, except metals, animals, and liquids, can be electrified by rubbing them and that metals, animals and liquids could be electrified by means of an electrostatic generators
• 1737 — C.F. du Fay and Francis Hauksbee independently discovers two kinds of frictional electricity: one generated from rubbing glass, the other from rubbing resin (later identified as positive and negative electrical charges).
• 1740 — Jean le Rond d'Alembert, in Mémoire sur la réfraction des corps solides, explains the process of refraction.
• 1745 — Pieter van Musschenbroek invents the Leyden jar, a type of capacitor.
• 1746 — Leonhard Euler develops the wave theory of light refraction and dispersion
• 1747 — William Watson, while experimenting with a Leyden jar, observes that a discharge of static electricity causes electric current to flow and develops the concept of an electrical potential (voltage).
• 1752 — Benjamin Franklin shows that lightning is electricity. Also credited with the convention of using "negative" and "positive" to denote an electrical charge or potential.
• 1767 — Joseph Priestley proposes an electrical inverse-square law
• 1784 — Henry Cavendish defines the inductive capacity of dielectrics (insulators) and measures the specific inductive capacity of various substances by comparison with an air condenser.
• 1785 — Charles Coulomb introduces the inverse-square law of electrostatics
• 1786 — Luigi Galvani discovers "animal electricity" and postulates that animal bodies are storehouses of electricity. His invention of the voltaic cell leads to the invention the electric battery.