1863 in science

Chemistry

• August 1 – Friedrich Bayer founds the chemical manufacturing company of Bayer at Barmen in Germany.
• Teerfarbenfabrik Meister, Lucius & Co. of Höchst in Germany produce a green dye from coal tar.

  Life sciences

• Max Schultze advances cell theory with the observation that animal and vegetable protoplasm are identical.
• The first outbreak of phylloxera on the European mainland is observed, in the vineyards of the southern Rhône region of France.
• Henry Walter Bates publishes The Naturalist on the River Amazons.

  Medicine

• February 17 – First meeting of what will become the International Committee of the Red Cross is held in Geneva, Switzerland, following the lead of humanitarian Henry Dunant.
• William Banting publishes Letter on Corpulence, Addressed to the Public in London, the first popular low-carbohydrate diet.
• Ivan Sechenov publishes Refleksy golovnogo mozga.

  Meteorology

• The Paris Observatory begins to publish weather maps.

  Paleontology

• Richard Owen publishes the first description of a fossilised bird, Archaeopteryx.

  Physics

• January – John Tyndall first explains the workings of the greenhouse effect.

  Technology

• February 10 – Alanson Crane patents a fire extinguisher.
• Spring – John Jonathon Pratt builds a practical form of typewriter in the United States.
• July – The tiny Confederate States of America hand-propelled submarine H. L. Hunley is first tested successfully.
• October 23 – The Ffestiniog Railway in North Wales introduces steam locomotives into general service, the first time this has been done anywhere in the world on a public railway of such a narrow gauge.
• December 19 – Linoleum patented in the United Kingdom.

  Events and institutions

• March 3 – National Academy of Sciences incorporated in the United States.
• Summer – The Chōshū Five leave Japan secretly to study Western science and technology in Britain, at University College London, part of the ending of sakoku.
• November 29 – Polytechnic University of Milan founded as the Istituto Tecnico Superiore.

  Publications

• January 31 – The first of Jules Verne's scientifically inspired Voyages Extraordinaires, the novel Cinq semaines en ballon, is published in Paris.

  Awards

• Copley Medal: Adam Sedgwick
• Wollaston Medal for Geology: Gustav Bischof

  Births

• March 25 – Simon Flexner, American pathologist and bacteriologist.
• April 29 – Signe Häggman, Finnish pioneer of physical education of the disabled.
• May 14 – John Charles Fields, Canadian mathematician.
• July 12 – Paul Drude, German physicist.
• October 16 – Beverly Thomas Galloway, American plant pathologist.
• November 25 – Ioan Cantacuzino, Romanian microbiologist.
• Undated – Cuthbert Christy, English medical investigator, zoologist and explorer.

  Deaths

• March 7 – Charles Wilkins Short, American botanist.
• June 25 – Thomas Evans Blackwell, English civil and hydraulic engineer.
• July 21 – Josephine Kablick, Czech botanist and paleontologist.
• December 8 – Jacques Etienne Chevalley de Rivaz , Swiss-born physician