1883 in science

The year 1883 in science and technology included many events, some of which are listed here.

Geology

• August 26 – Krakatoa begins its final phase of eruptions at 1:06pm local time. These produce a number of tsunamis, mainly in the early hours of the next day, which result in about 36,000 deaths on the islands of Sumatra and Java. The final explosion at 10:02am on August 27 destroys the island of Krakatoa itself and is heard up to 3000 miles away

Awards

• Copley Medal: William Thomson, Lord Kelvin
• Wollaston Medal for Geology: William Thomas Blanford

Births

• May 13 – Georgios Papanikolaou (d. 1962), inventor of the Pap smear.
• June 24 – Victor Francis Hess (d. 1964), American physicist.
• October 8 – Otto Heinrich Warburg (d. 1970), German physiologist and winner of the 1931 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

Deaths

• June 26 – Edward Sabine (b. 1788), physicist, astronomer and explorer.
• December 8 – François Lenormant (b. 1837), assyriologist and numismatist.