Famous Personalities — Scientists and Inventors MCQs

Correct Answer: Theory of Relativity

Einstein is famous for the theory of relativity (special, 1905, and general, 1915).

Correct Answer: 1921

Einstein's Nobel Prize in Physics was for the year 1921 (announced and presented in 1922) for the photoelectric effect.

Correct Answer: Motion and gravity

Newton formulated the laws of motion and the law of universal gravitation.

Correct Answer: Principia

Newton's 'Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica' (1687) is known as the Principia.

Correct Answer: Electric bulb

Edison developed the first commercially practical incandescent electric bulb (1879).

Correct Answer: 1000

Edison held 1,093 US patents; the booklet's 'approximately 1000' is that rounded figure.

Correct Answer: Telephone

Alexander Graham Bell patented the telephone in 1876.

Correct Answer: Airplane

The Wright brothers made the first sustained powered airplane flight in 1903.

Correct Answer: Physics and Chemistry

Marie Curie won the Nobel Prize in Physics (1903) and in Chemistry (1911).

Correct Answer: Radium and Polonium

Marie Curie discovered polonium (1898) and radium (1898) with Pierre Curie.

Correct Answer: Physicist

Stephen Hawking was a theoretical physicist known for work on black holes and cosmology.

Correct Answer: A Brief History of Time

'A Brief History of Time' (1988) is Hawking's best-known popular book on cosmology.

Correct Answer: Microsoft

Bill Gates co-founded Microsoft with Paul Allen in 1975.

Correct Answer: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Gates's philanthropy runs through the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, founded in 2000.

Correct Answer: Tesla and SpaceX

Elon Musk is CEO of Tesla and of SpaceX.

Correct Answer: SpaceX

Musk founded SpaceX in 2002.

Correct Answer: Alan Turing

Alan Turing is conventionally called the father of computer science for his 1936 work on computation and the Turing machine.

Correct Answer: Charles Babbage

Charles Babbage designed the Analytical Engine in the 1830s, a forerunner of the modern computer.

Correct Answer: Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein is conventionally called the father of modern physics for relativity and his work on the photoelectric effect.

Correct Answer: Isaac Newton

Isaac Newton formulated the law of universal gravitation in the 1680s.

Correct Answer: Johannes Kepler

Johannes Kepler proposed the three laws of planetary motion in the early 1600s.

Correct Answer: Johannes Gutenberg

Johannes Gutenberg invented movable-type printing in Europe in the mid-1400s.

Correct Answer: Alexander Fleming

Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928.

Correct Answer: Wilhelm Roentgen

Wilhelm Roentgen discovered X-rays in 1895.

Correct Answer: Henri Becquerel

Henri Becquerel discovered radioactivity in 1896.

Correct Answer: Marie Curie

Marie Curie won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1903, the first woman Nobel laureate.

Correct Answer: Alfred Nobel

Alfred Nobel invented dynamite in 1867.

Correct Answer: Alfred Nobel

The Nobel Prizes are awarded under Alfred Nobel's will (1895) in his memory.

Correct Answer: William Harvey

William Harvey described the circulation of blood in 'De Motu Cordis' (1628).

Correct Answer: Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin founded the theory of evolution by natural selection in 'On the Origin of Species' (1859).

Correct Answer: J.J. Thomson

J.J. Thomson discovered the electron in 1897 through his cathode-ray experiments.

Correct Answer: James Chadwick

James Chadwick discovered the neutron in 1932.

Correct Answer: Ernest Rutherford

Ernest Rutherford identified the proton in 1917-1920 through his nuclear experiments.

Correct Answer: John Dalton

John Dalton proposed the modern atomic theory in the early 1800s: matter is made of indivisible atoms.

Correct Answer: Antoine Lavoisier

Antoine Lavoisier is conventionally called the father of modern chemistry for the law of conservation of mass and his chemical nomenclature.

Correct Answer: Dmitri Mendeleev

Dmitri Mendeleev published the periodic table of the elements in 1869.

Correct Answer: Hippocrates

Hippocrates (c. 460-370 BC) is conventionally called the father of medicine for separating medicine from superstition.

Correct Answer: Al-Zahrawi

Al-Zahrawi (Abulcasis, 936-1013), the Andalusian surgeon, is conventionally called the father of surgery for his 'Kitab al-Tasrif' and surgical instruments.

Correct Answer: James Watt

James Watt patented his improved steam engine in 1769, the design that powered the Industrial Revolution.

Correct Answer: Guglielmo Marconi

Guglielmo Marconi developed practical wireless telegraphy in the 1890s and is conventionally credited with inventing radio.

Correct Answer: Frederick Banting

Frederick Banting discovered insulin in 1921, making diabetes treatable.

Correct Answer: John Logie Baird

John Logie Baird demonstrated the first working television system in 1926.

Correct Answer: Antonie van Leeuwenhoek

Antonie van Leeuwenhoek built powerful single-lens microscopes in the 1670s and first observed bacteria and other micro-organisms.

Correct Answer: Michael Faraday

Michael Faraday built the first electromagnetic generator (the Faraday disk) in 1831.

Correct Answer: Michael Faraday

Michael Faraday is conventionally called the father of electromagnetism for discovering electromagnetic induction in 1831.

Correct Answer: Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky's generative grammar (from 'Syntactic Structures', 1957) revolutionised linguistics and made him the conventional 'father of modern linguistics' in one-liner usage.

Correct Answer: John McCarthy

John McCarthy coined the term 'artificial intelligence' and organised the 1956 Dartmouth conference that founded the field.

Correct Answer: Joseph Engelberger

Joseph Engelberger founded Unimation, the first robotics company, and is conventionally called the father of robotics.

Correct Answer: Ronald Fisher

Ronald Fisher founded modern statistical inference in the 1920s, including analysis of variance and maximum likelihood.

Correct Answer: Watson & Crick

James Watson and Francis Crick published the double-helix model of DNA in Nature in 1953.

Correct Answer: Georges Lemaître

Georges Lemaître proposed the 'primeval atom' origin of the universe in 1927, the basis of Big Bang theory.

Correct Answer: Edwin Hubble

Edwin Hubble's 1929 observations showed galaxies receding from each other, establishing that the universe is expanding.

Correct Answer: Gregor Mendel

Gregor Mendel's pea-plant experiments (1860s) established the laws of inheritance, making him the father of genetics.

Correct Answer: Edward Jenner

Edward Jenner introduced smallpox vaccination in 1796, using cowpox to protect against smallpox.

Correct Answer: Joseph Lister

Joseph Lister introduced carbolic-acid antisepsis in surgery in 1867, drastically cutting post-operative infection.

Correct Answer: Galileo Galilei

Galileo Galilei's telescopic observations from 1609 (Jupiter's moons, Venus's phases, the Moon's craters) founded observational astronomy.

Correct Answer: Chinese scholars

The compass was invented in China during the Han dynasty, using lodestone, and later refined there for navigation before spreading westward.

Correct Answer: Galileo Galilei

Hans Lippershey patented the first telescope in 1608; Galileo Galilei built an improved version in 1609 and used it for his astronomical observations, which is why the booklet credits him with the improved telescope.

Correct Answer: Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit

Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit invented the mercury thermometer in 1714 and devised the Fahrenheit temperature scale.

Correct Answer: Anders Celsius

Swedish astronomer Anders Celsius proposed the centigrade (Celsius) temperature scale in 1742.

Correct Answer: Evangelista Torricelli

Evangelista Torricelli invented the mercury barometer in 1643, demonstrating atmospheric pressure.

Correct Answer: Louis Pasteur

Louis Pasteur founded modern microbiology through germ theory, pasteurisation and vaccines.

Correct Answer: William Morton

William Morton gave the first public demonstration of ether anaesthesia at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, in October 1846.

Correct Answer: Maryam Mirzakhani

Maryam Mirzakhani of Iran won the Fields Medal in 2014, the first woman to receive mathematics' highest honour.

Correct Answer: Nikola Tesla

Nikola Tesla developed the alternating-current power system that became the basis of the modern electric power industry.

Correct Answer: Nikola Tesla

Nikola Tesla developed the polyphase alternating-current system (generator, transformer and motor), licensed to Westinghouse in 1888.

Correct Answer: Wright Brothers

Orville and Wilbur Wright made the first sustained powered flight at Kitty Hawk in December 1903, and are conventionally called the fathers of aviation.