1817 in science

Biology

• Georges Cuvier publishes Le Règne Animal.

Chemistry

• Discovery of cadmium by Friedrich Stromeyer.
• Discovery of lithium by Johann Arfvedson.
• Discovery of selenium by Jöns Jakob Berzelius.
• Pierre-Joseph Pelletier and Joseph Bienaimé Caventou isolate chlorophyll and emetine.
• Leopold Gmelin begins publication of his Handbuch der theoretischen Chemie.

Medicine

• First cholera pandemic (1817–24) originates in Bengal, reaching Calcutta by September.
• James Parkinson publishes , describing "paralysis agitans", the condition which will become known as Parkinson's disease.

Technology

• March – Ackermann steering geometry invented by Georg Lankensperger.
• June 12 – German inventor Karl Drais drives his dandy horse, the earliest form of bicycle, in Mannheim.
• July 10 – David Brewster patents the kaleidoscope.

Institutions

• October 1 – Philomaths established secretly by Poles at the Imperial University of Vilnius.

Awards

• Copley Medal: Henry Kater

Births

• January 29 – William Ferrel, American meteorologist.
• February 15 – Robert Angus Smith, Scottish-born atmospheric chemist.
• April 8 – Charles-Édouard Brown-Séquard, Mauritian-born physiologist and neurologist.
• May 31 – Joseph Marie Élisabeth Durocher, French geologist.
• June 30 – Joseph Dalton Hooker, English botanist.
• July 5 – Carl Vogt, German scientist who publishes notable works in zoology, geology and physiology.
• July 15 – John Fowler, English civil engineer.
• September 10 – Richard Spruce, English botanist.
• October 10 – C. H. D. Buys Ballot, Dutch meteorologist.
• October 17 – Alfred Des Cloizeaux, French mineralogist.
• November 26 – Charles-Adolphe Wurtz, Alsatian French chemist.
• December 13 – Arthur Hill Hassall, English physician, microbiologist and chemical analyst.
• December 14 – Sophia Wilkens, Swedish pioneer in the education of students with intellectual disability.

Deaths

• January 1 – Martin Heinrich Klaproth, German chemist.
• April 12 – Charles Messier, French astronomer.
• May 12 – William Goforth, American physician and paleontologist.
• June 2 – Clotilde Tambroni, Italian philologist and linguist
• June 11 – William Gregor, Cornish mineralogist.
• July 28 – Abraham Gottlob Werner, German geologist.
• August 7 – Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours, French-born American industrialist.
• September 18 – William Charles Wells, American physician.
• November 7 – Jean-André Deluc, Swiss geologist.
• December 15 – Abate Giovanni Battista Guglielmini, Bolognese physicist.