1728 in science
# 1728 in science

The year 1728 in science and technology involved some significant events.

## Astronomy

* James Bradley uses stellar aberration (first observed in 1725) to calculate the speed of light to be approximately 301,000 km/s.
* James Bradley observes nutation of the Earth's axis.

## Botany

* September – Bartram's Garden, the oldest surviving botanic garden in North America, is established in Philadelphia by John Bartram.

## Exploration

* July 14 – August 14 – Vitus Bering sails northward from the Kamchatka Peninsula, through the Bering Strait, and rounds Cape Dezhnev.

## Physiology and medicine

* Pierre Fauchard publishes Le Chirurgien Dentiste, ou, Traité des Dents, the first comprehensive text on dentistry, including the first description of orthodontic braces.

## Births

* February 13 – John Hunter, Scottish surgeon, pathologist and comparative anatomist (died 1793)
* March 20 – Samuel-Auguste Tissot, Swiss physician (died 1797)
* April 16 – Joseph Black, Scottish physicist and chemist (died 1799)
* August 26 – Johann Heinrich Lambert, Swiss polymath (died 1777)
* September 3 – Matthew Boulton, English mechanical engineer (died 1809)
* October 27 – James Cook, English explorer (died 1779)

## Deaths

* April 25 – John Woodward, English naturalist (born 1665)
* August 11 – William Sherard, English botanist (born 1659)
* Caleb Threlkeld, Irish botanist (born 1676)
