Kepler's first major astronomical work, Mysterium Cosmographicum (1596), was the first published defense of the Copernican system.

Late in life, Isaac Newton suffered a nervous breakdown, but it probably wasn't his fault. A 1979 examination of Newton's hair showed astronomical amounts of mercury, probably as a result of all of his alchemy experiments. Too much mercury can drive a man mad, and that may have been exactly what it did to Newton.

Al-Kindi is unanimously hailed as the "father of Islamic or Arabic philosophy" for his synthesis, adaptation and promotion of Greek and Hellenistic philosophy in the Muslim world. As an advanced chemist, he debunked the myth that simple, base metals could be transformed into precious metals such as gold or silver.

A biography by Galileo's pupil Vincenzo Viviani stated that Galileo had dropped balls of the same material, but different masses, from the Leaning Tower of Pisa to demonstrate that their time of descent was independent of their mass.

Phrenology, which has been disproven, tried to link personality and character to head shape.

Hydrology is the scientific study of the movement, distribution, and quality of water on Earth and other planets.

Darwin's five-year voyage on HMS Beagle established him as an eminent geologist, and publication of his journal of the voyage made him famous as a popular author.

Evangelista Torricelli (1608-1647) was an Italian physicist and mathematician, best known for the invention of the mercury barometer, but also highly regarded for his advances in optics and work on the method of indivisibles.

While 13th century authors failed to provide an accurate explanation for the rainbow, at the turn of the fourteenth century Theodoric was able to give one of the first correct geometrical analyses of this phenomenon, which was "probably the most dramatic development of 14th and 15th-century optics".

William Harvey, an English physician, was the first known to describe completely and in detail the systemic circulation and properties of blood being pumped to the brain and body by the heart, though earlier writers, such as Realdo Colombo, Michael Servetus, and Jacques Dubois, had provided precursors of the theory.