Stone tools Hand axe Bow and arrow Clothing & needles Boats & seafaring Agriculture Pottery Irrigation Trepanation Writing Alphabet Library of Alexandria Paper Wheel Spoked-wheel chariot Bronze Iron Glass Classical medicine Egyptian medicine Edwin Smith Papyrus Mesopotamian medicine Hippocrates Sushruta & Ayurveda Chinese medicine Greco-Roman engineering Archimedes Antikythera mechanism Heron's aeolipile Watermill Roman concrete Aqueducts Woodblock printing Movable type Jikji (metal type) Gunpowder Cannon & firearms Compass Islamic Golden Age House of Wisdom Numerals & zero Al-Razi Canon of Medicine Ibn al-Haytham Ibn al-Nafis Hospitals Windmill Mechanical clock Eyeglasses Quarantine Printing press Gutenberg Bible Scientific Revolution Telescope Microscope Van Leeuwenhoek Vesalius's Fabrica Harvey's circulation Newton's Principia Mechanical calculator Lind's scurvy trial Columbian Exchange Quinine Variolation Steam engine Textile machines Factories Railways Steamships Bessemer steel Oil industry Volta's battery Induction (Faraday) Telegraph Transatlantic cable Photography Babbage's engines Ada Lovelace Jacquard loom Smallpox vaccine Anesthesia Stethoscope Germ theory Louis Pasteur Robert Koch Semmelweis Sanitation movement John Snow Florence Nightingale Antisepsis Mendel's peas Electric power Light bulb Thomas Edison Tesla & AC Skyscrapers Telephone Radio Vacuum tube Television Radar Automobile Assembly line Airplane Jet engine Goddard's rocket X-rays Penicillin Salvarsan Sulfa drugs Vitamins Aspirin Blood transfusion Insulin 1918 flu pandemic Plastics Haber–Bosch Classical genetics Alan Turing Fission discovered Electronic computer Transistor Integrated circuit Laser ARPANET Nuclear energy Hiroshima & Nagasaki Nuclear power DNA double helix Rosalind Franklin Space Race V-2 rocket Sputnik 1 Yuri Gagarin Moon landing Streptomycin Antibiotic resistance Polio vaccine The Pill Organ transplants Chemotherapy Ultrasound Green Revolution Microprocessor Personal computer GUI & mouse Mobile phone GPS The Internet World Wide Web Genetic engineering Biotech drugs DNA sequencing PCR Human Genome Project IVF CT scan MRI Smallpox eradicated HIV/AIDS Antiretrovirals Chernobyl Lithium-ion battery Smartphone Social media Deep learning AlphaGo Transformer AlphaFold CRISPR CRISPR cure (Casgevy) mRNA vaccines Karikó & Weissman COVID-19 Immunotherapy Robotic surgery Reusable rockets Solar, batteries & EVs Prehistory 3.3 million years ago – 3500 BC Ancient world 3500 BC – AD 500 Medieval 500 – 1450 Printing & the scientific revolution 1450 – 1750
Tools, energy & materials
Transport & space
Communication & computing
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Detail: All detail
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3.3 million years ago – 3500 BC
Stone, fire and farming: the first technologies.
Stone toolsc. 3.3 million years ago (Lomekwi, Kenya) Hand axec. 1.76 million years ago Control of firec. 1 million years ago; routine by c. 400,000 years ago Boats & seafaringby c. 65,000–50,000 years ago (reaching Australia); oldest boat c. 8000 BC Bow and arrowc. 64,000 years ago (South Africa) Clothing & needleseyed needles c. 45,000 years ago; clothing earlier Potteryc. 20,000 years ago (China); widespread with farming Agriculturec. 9500 BC onward (Fertile Crescent; later China, the Americas, Africa) Trepanationby c. 7000 BC (many skulls show healing) Irrigationc. 6000 BC (Mesopotamia)
3500 BC – AD 500
Writing, metals, the wheel and the first doctors.
Wheelc. 3500 BC (Mesopotamia, Europe) Writingc. 3300–3100 BC (Sumer, Egypt); later China, Mesoamerica Bronzec. 3300–3000 BC (Near East); copper smelting from c. 5000 BC Egyptian medicinec. 2700–1000 BC Glassc. 2500 BC (Mesopotamia); glassblowing c. 50 BC Spoked-wheel chariotc. 2000 BC (Eurasian steppe) Mesopotamian medicinec. 2000–600 BC; Diagnostic Handbook c. 1050 BC Alphabetc. 1850 BC (Proto-Sinaitic); Phoenician c. 1050 BC Edwin Smith Papyrusc. 1600 BC (copied from older texts) Ironc. 1400 BC (Anatolia); widespread after 1200 BC Sushruta & AyurvedaSushruta Samhita c. 600 BC – AD 300 (dates disputed) Classical medicinec. 500 BC – AD 200 Hippocratesc. 460 – c. 370 BC AqueductsAqua Appia 312 BC; Rome had 11 by AD 226 Chinese medicineHuangdi Neijing compiled c. 300–100 BC Greco-Roman engineeringc. 300 BC – AD 300 Archimedesc. 287–212 BC Library of Alexandriafounded c. 285 BC Watermillc. 250 BC (Greek world) Roman concretec. 200 BC onward; Pantheon dome c. AD 126 Paperc. 150 BC (China); Cai Lun's recipe AD 105 Antikythera mechanismc. 150–100 BC (date debated) Heron's aeolipilec. AD 60 (Alexandria) GalenAD 129 – c. 216
500 – 1450
Paper, printing, gunpowder, clocks and great hospitals.
Numerals & zerozero by 628 (Brahmagupta); al-Khwarizmi c. 825; Europe 1202 Woodblock printingc. 600s–700s (Tang China, Korea); Diamond Sutra 868 Islamic Golden Agec. 800–1300 HospitalsBaghdad c. 805; Byzantine hospitals from 369 House of Wisdomc. 800s–900s (Baghdad) Gunpowderc. 850 (Tang China); first formula printed 1044 Windmillc. 900 (Persia); Europe c. 1185 Al-Razic. 865–925 Ibn al-Haythamc. 965–1040; Book of Optics 1011–1021 Canon of Medicinecompleted 1025 Movable typec. 1040 (ceramic type, Song China) Compassc. 1040–1117 (Song China); Europe c. 1190 Ibn al-Nafis1242 (pulmonary circulation) Mechanical clockc. 1270–1300 (Europe); Su Song's water clock 1088 Eyeglassesc. 1286 (Pisa) Cannon & firearmsc. 1280s (China); Europe by 1326 Black Death1347–1351 Jikji (metal type)July 1377 (Goryeo Korea) Quarantine1377 (Ragusa, now Dubrovnik)
1450 – 1750
Printing spreads ideas; telescope, microscope and anatomy.
Printing pressc. 1440–1450 (Mainz) Gutenberg Biblec. 1454–1455 Columbian Exchangefrom 1492 American epidemics1518–1520 onward (death tolls debated) Scientific Revolutionc. 1543–1687 Vesalius's Fabrica1543 Ambroise Paré1510–1590; wound treatise 1545 Microscopec. 1590–1620 (Netherlands; inventor disputed) Telescope1608 (Netherlands; priority disputed); Galileo 1609 Galileo1564–1642; telescope observations 1609–10 Mechanical calculator1623 (Schickard); 1642 (Pascal); 1673 (Leibniz) Harvey's circulation1628 (De Motu Cordis) Quininec. 1630s (Peru); quinine isolated 1820 Van Leeuwenhoek1632–1723; saw bacteria 1676 Newton's Principia1687 Newcomen engine1712 Variolationlong used in Asia and Africa; England 1721 Lind's scurvy trialMay 1747
1750 – 1870
Steam, factories, railways, anesthesia and germ fighting.
Textile machines1764–1785 Steam enginepatent 1769; engines from 1776 Factories1771 (Arkwright's Cromford Mill) Smallpox vaccineMay 14, 1796 Volta's battery1800 Jacquard loom1804 Steamships1807 (Fulton's Clermont; earlier trials from 1783) Stethoscope1816 (René Laennec, Paris); his book 1819 Babbage's engines1822 (Difference Engine); 1837 (Analytical Engine design) Railways1825 (Stockton & Darlington); 1830 (Liverpool & Manchester) Photography1826–27 (Niépce); 1839 (Daguerre, Talbot) Induction (Faraday)August 1831 Telegraph1837 (Cooke & Wheatstone; Morse); Morse code line 1844 Sanitation movement1842 (Chadwick report); 1848 (UK Public Health Act) Ada Lovelace1815–1852; notes published 1843 AnesthesiaOctober 16, 1846 (Morton, Boston); Long used ether 1842 SemmelweisMay 1847 (Vienna) John Snow1854 (Broad Street pump) Florence Nightingale1854–56 (Crimea); nursing school 1860 Bessemer steel1856 (Bessemer; William Kelly in parallel) Germ theoryc. 1857–1890 (Pasteur, Koch) Transatlantic cable1858 (failed after weeks); lasting from 1866 Oil industry1859 (Drake's well, Pennsylvania); Baku wells from 1846 Louis Pasteur1822–1895; swan-neck flasks 1859–62 Antisepsis1865 (first antiseptic case, Glasgow); published 1867 Mendel's peas1856–1863 experiments; published 1866
1870 – 1939
Electricity, radio, cars, airplanes, X-rays and antibiotics.
Electric powerdynamo 1871 (Gramme); power stations 1882 Automobileengine 1876 (Otto); car 1886 (Benz) TelephoneMarch 1876 (Bell; Gray and Meucci claims) Robert Koch1843–1910; anthrax 1876, TB 1882 Thomas Edison1847–1931; Menlo Park lab 1876 Light bulb1878–80 (Swan, Edison; priority disputed) Skyscrapers1885 (Home Insurance Building, Chicago; 'first' debated); Otis safety elevator 1852–57 Tesla & AC1856–1943; AC motor patents 1888 Radio1895 (Marconi; Tesla, Bose, Popov also claimed) X-raysNovember 8, 1895 AspirinAugust 1897 (Hoffmann at Bayer; Eichengrün later claimed credit); sold from 1899 Marie Curie1867–1934; polonium and radium 1898 Classical genetics1900 (Mendel rediscovered); 1910s (Morgan's flies) Blood transfusion1901 (Landsteiner); blood banks 1937 AirplaneDecember 17, 1903 Vacuum tube1904 (Fleming diode); 1906 (De Forest triode) Plastics1907 (Bakelite); nylon 1935 Haber–Bosch1909 (Haber); industrial 1913 (Bosch) Salvarsan1910 (Ehrlich, Hata) Vitamins1912 (Funk; Hopkins) Assembly lineDecember 1913 (Highland Park) 1918 flu pandemic1918–1920 Insulin1921–22 (Banting, Best, Collip, Macleod; credit disputed) Television1926 (Baird); electronic 1927 (Farnsworth, Zworykin) Goddard's rocketMarch 16, 1926 PenicillinSeptember 1928 (Fleming); made a drug by Florey, Chain and Heatley 1940–44 Radar1935 (Watson-Watt; developed in several nations) Sulfa drugs1935 (Prontosil, Domagk) Alan Turing1912–1954; 'On Computable Numbers' 1936 Jet engine1937 (Whittle, von Ohain); first jet flight 1939 Fission discoveredDecember 1938 (Hahn, Strassmann; explained by Meitner, Frisch)
1939 – 1970
Computers, nuclear power, DNA, vaccines and the Moon.
Electronic computer1941–1946 (Z3, Colossus, ENIAC; 'first' disputed) Nuclear energyfirst reactor December 2, 1942 Manhattan Project1942–1946 V-2 rocketfirst successful launch October 3, 1942; used in war from September 1944 Streptomycin1943 (Schatz, Waksman; credit disputed) Hiroshima & NagasakiAugust 6 and 9, 1945 Antibiotic resistancewarned 1945 (Fleming); MRSA 1961; now a global threat Green Revolutionc. 1945–1970s (Borlaug's wheat; IR8 rice 1966) Chemotherapy1946 (nitrogen mustard); 1948 (Farber) TransistorDecember 1947 (Bell Labs) Rosalind Franklin1920–1958; Photo 51 May 1952 DNA double helixApril 1953 (Watson, Crick, with Franklin's and Wilkins's data) Nuclear power1954 (Obninsk); 1956 (Calder Hall) Organ transplantskidney December 1954 (Murray); heart December 1967 (Barnard) Polio vaccine1955 (Salk); 1961 (Sabin oral) Space Race1957–1975 Sputnik 1October 4, 1957 Integrated circuit1958 (Kilby); 1959 (Noyce) Ultrasound1958 (Donald, Glasgow; earlier work 1940s) The Pillapproved May 1960 (US) LaserMay 16, 1960 (Maiman; patent dispute with Gould) Yuri GagarinApril 12, 1961 Moon landingJuly 20, 1969 ARPANETOctober 29, 1969
1970 – 2000
Microchips, PCs, the internet and medical imaging.
MicroprocessorNovember 1971 CT scanOctober 1, 1971 (Hounsfield; theory by Cormack) Genetic engineering1973 (Cohen & Boyer) Mobile phoneApril 3, 1973 (Cooper's call); networks from 1979 GUI & mousemouse 1968 (Engelbart); Xerox Alto 1973; Macintosh 1984 MRI1973 (Lauterbur's first MR image); first human body scan 1977; Damadian disputes credit The Internet1974 (Cerf & Kahn design); switched on January 1, 1983 Personal computer1975 (Altair); 1977 (Apple II, PET, TRS-80); IBM PC 1981 DNA sequencing1977 (Sanger; Maxam and Gilbert) GPSfirst satellite 1978; fully working 1995 IVFJuly 25, 1978 (Louise Brown) Biotech drugs1978 (Genentech); approved 1982 Smallpox eradicateddeclared May 8, 1980 (last natural case 1977) HIV/AIDSfirst reported June 5, 1981; virus identified 1983 PCR1983 (Mullis) ChernobylApril 26, 1986 AntiretroviralsAZT 1987; combination therapy 1996 World Wide Webproposed March 1989; public 1991 (Berners-Lee) Human Genome Project1990–2003 (draft 2001) Lithium-ion battery1991 (Sony); invented 1970s–1985
2000 – today
Smartphones, genomes, CRISPR, mRNA and AI.
Robotic surgeryJuly 2000 (da Vinci approved, US) Social media2004 (Facebook) onward GLP-1 drugsexenatide 2005; semaglutide for weight 2021 Karikó & Weissman2005 paper; Nobel Prize 2023 SmartphoneJune 29, 2007 (iPhone); Android 2008 Solar, batteries & EVsc. 2008–today (solar cell 1954; costs fell ~90% in the 2010s) Immunotherapy2011 (ipilimumab); CAR-T 2017 Deep learning2012 (AlexNet); roots 1986 onward CRISPRJune 2012 (Doudna, Charpentier); Zhang 2013 (patent dispute) Reusable rocketsNovember–December 2015 (Blue Origin, SpaceX landings) AlphaGoMarch 2016 (Seoul) TransformerJune 2017 (Google) Large language models2018 (GPT); ChatGPT November 30, 2022 COVID-19December 2019 – May 2023 (WHO emergency); origin debated Quantum computers2019 ('quantum supremacy' claim, disputed) mRNA vaccinesDecember 2020 (COVID-19 vaccines) AlphaFoldNovember 2020 (CASP14) CRISPR cure (Casgevy)November 2023 (UK); December 2023 (US)