1984 in science - Definition

The year 1984 in science and technology observed many events, some of which are included in the list below.

Astronomy and space exploration

• February 7 - Astronauts Bruce McCandless II and Robert L. Stewart make the first untethered space walk.

Computer science

• January 5 - Richard Stallman starts developing GNU.
• January 22 - The Apple Macintosh, the first consumer computer to use a computer mouse and GUI interface, is introduced by Apple Computer corporation

Technology

• July 21 - In Jackson, Michigan, a factory robot crushes a worker against a safety bar in apparently the first robot-related death in the United States.

Awards

• Nobel Prizes
  • Physics - Carlo Rubbia, Simon van der Meer
  • Chemistry - Robert Bruce Merrifield
  • Medicine - Niels K. Jerne, Georges J. F. Köhler, César Milstein
• Turing Award - Niklaus Wirth

Births

Deaths

• May 13 - Stanislaw Marcin Ulam (b. 1909), mathematician.
• October 20 - Paul Dirac (b. 1902), physicist.