The year 1962 in science and technology included many events, some of which are listed below.

Astronomy and space exploration

• January 26 - Ranger 3 is launched to study the Moon. The space probe later missed the Moon by 22,000 miles.
• February 2 - For the first time in 400 years Neptune and Pluto align.
• February 20 - Mercury program: While aboard Friendship 7, John Glenn orbits the Earth three times in 4 hours, 55 minutes becoming the first American to orbit the Earth.
• April 26 - The Ranger 4 spacecraft crashes into the Moon.

Awards

• Nobel Prizes
  • Physics - Lev Davidovich Landau
  • Chemistry - Max Ferdinand Perutz, John Cowdery Kendrew
  • Medicine - Francis Harry Compton Crick, James Dewey Watson, Maurice Hugh Frederick Wilkins

Deaths

• February 19 - Georgios Papanikolaou (b. 1883), inventor of the Pap smear.
• March 24 - Auguste Piccard (b. 1884), physicist and explorer.
• November 18 - Niels Bohr (b. 1885), Danish physicist.
• December 20 - Emil Artin (b. 1898), mathematician.
• December 24 - Wilhelm Ackermann (b. 1896), mathematician.