November 25:
(1814) German physician and physicist Julius von Mayer is born. He was one of the discoverers of thermodynamics, the branch of science looking at heat and temperature in relation to energy and work.
(1887) Russian botanist and geneticist Nikolai Vavilov is born. He is known for studying and improving wheat, corn and other cereal crops – the crops that now sustain the global population.
(1913) American physician, poet, and etymologist Lewis Thomas is born. His autobiography, The Youngest Science: Notes of a Medicine Watcher, described the changes in medicine over a hundred years.
