Isaac Newton
1643–1727, Woolsthorpe-by-Colsterworth, Lincolnshire, England, London, England
English mathematician and physicist, Lucasian Professor at Cambridge, who developed the method of fluxions (differential and integral calculus) independently of Leibniz, generalized the binomial theorem to fractional and negative exponents, and in the Principia Mathematica (1687) unified the laws of motion and universal gravitation.
Isaac Newton was born at Woolsthorpe Manor in Lincolnshire, England, on 25 December 1642 by the Julian calendar then in use in England (4 January 1643 by the Gregorian calendar), several months after the death of his father, a farmer of the same name. When his mother remarried and moved away, he was raised by his maternal grandmother; after schooling at The King's School, Grantham, he entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1661 as a sizar, working to cover his expenses, and graduated in 1665.
When the Great Plague forced Cambridge to close in 1665, Newton spent roughly two years back at Woolsthorpe in what came to be called his annus mirabilis, laying the groundwork for his method of fluxions — an approach to differential and integral calculus — for his theory of light and color, and for the law of universal gravitation. Returning to Cambridge, he was elected Lucasian Professor of Mathematics in 1669 at age twenty-six, succeeding Isaac Barrow. His generalization of the binomial theorem to fractional and negative exponents, developed during this period, became a central tool in his later work on infinite series.
Urged and financially supported by Edmond Halley, Newton published Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica in 1687, setting out the three laws of motion and the law of universal gravitation and showing that they explain both terrestrial mechanics and the motion of the planets, comets and tides within a single mathematical framework; it is widely regarded as one of the most important scientific works ever written. His Opticks (1704) detailed his experiments splitting white light with prisms and described the reflecting telescope he had built. Newton's development of calculus proceeded independently of, though roughly contemporaneously with, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz's, and the resulting priority dispute between Newton and Leibniz, and between their respective national scientific communities, lasted the rest of both men's lives.
In 1696 Newton left Cambridge to become Warden, and later Master, of the Royal Mint in London, where he oversaw a major recoinage and pursued counterfeiters. He was elected President of the Royal Society in 1703, a post he held until his death, and was knighted by Queen Anne in 1705. Newton died in London on 20 March 1727 (Julian; 31 March by the Gregorian calendar) and was buried with state honors in Westminster Abbey.
Workplaces: Trinity College, University of Cambridge, Royal Mint, London
United Kingdom