The year 2005 in science and technology involved some significant events.

List of years in science (table)
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Astronomy

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Biology

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Climatology

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  • January 27 – Scientists behind the climateprediction.net project, a distributed computing project run from Oxford University, announce that first results indicate a long term surface temperature increase due to global warming of between 2 and 11 degrees Celsius as a consequence of doubling carbon dioxide levels, with most of the simulations predicting a temperature rise of around 3.4 °C.[4]

Computer science

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Paleontology

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  • January 13 – Chinese paleontologists announce the discovery of fossils of Repenomamus robustus and Repenomamus giganticus, mammals that lived 130 million years ago. The fossil discoveries indicate that these mammals preyed on small dinosaurs.[5]
  • February 17 – Two Ethiopian fossil skulls originally found in 1967 by Richard Leakey, Omo I and Omo II, are re-dated at 195,000 years old, making them the oldest Homo sapiens remains known.[6]
  • December 15 – European and Canadian researchers announce the dating of flint artefacts from Pakefield, Suffolk, UK to around 700,000 years ago, representing the earliest unequivocal evidence for human presence north of the Alps.[7]

Philosophy

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Physics

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Space exploration

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  • January 14 – The Huygens probe is successfully sent into the atmosphere of Titan and returns science data to Earth via the Cassini orbiter. It survives the landing on the surface of Titan and sends pictures and other data for more than an hour afterwards.
  • January 26 – ESA's SMART-1 begins sending back close range pictures of the lunar surface
  • February 7 – NASA announce budget plans – in the announcement, they state that a mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope will not take place, and that a robotic mission to deorbit the telescope with a safe descent into an ocean will take place. The Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter (Jimo) mission is also cancelled.
  • February 12 – ESA successfully launch an Ariane 5 ECA carrying three satellites. The previous attempt to launch the new design of rocket, in December 2002, failed when the rocket deviated from its course minutes into the flight.
  • July 4 – The Deep Impact spacecraft successfully observes the disintegration of its "impactor" section colliding with the comet Tempel 1. A large number of other telescopes also provide data on this event.

Technology

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Awards

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Appointments

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Other events

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Publications

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Deaths

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References

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  1. ^ Minchin, Robert; et al. (2005). "A Dark Hydrogen Cloud in the Virgo Cluster". The Astrophysical Journal. 622 (1): L21–L24. arXiv:astro-ph/0502312. Bibcode:2005ApJ...622L..21M. doi:10.1086/429538. S2CID 15639006.
  2. ^ Cornell University (2005-03-22). "Light detected from two planets outside solar system". Spaceflight Now. Retrieved 2011-12-08. Results are published in Nature and The Astrophysical Journal.
  3. ^ Kosfeld, Michael; et al. (2005). "Oxytocin increases trust in humans" (PDF). Nature. 435 (7042): 673–5. Bibcode:2005Natur.435..673K. doi:10.1038/nature03701. PMID 15931222. S2CID 1234727. Retrieved 2013-07-17.
  4. ^ Stainforth, D. A.; Aina, T.; Christensen, C.; Collins, M.; Faull, N.; et al. (2005). "Uncertainty in predictions of the climate response to rising levels of greenhouse gases". Nature. 433 (7024). Springer Science and Business Media LLC: 403–406. Bibcode:2005Natur.433..403S. doi:10.1038/nature03301. ISSN 0028-0836. PMID 15674288. S2CID 2547937.
  5. ^ Weil, Anne (2005-01-13). "Mammalian palaeobiology: Living large in the Cretaceous". Nature. 433 (7022). Springer Science and Business Media LLC: 116–117. Bibcode:2005Natur.433..116W. doi:10.1038/433116b. ISSN 0028-0836. PMID 15650725. S2CID 52869101.
  6. ^ McDougall, Ian; Brown, Francis H.; Fleagle, John G. (2005). "Stratigraphic placement and age of modern humans from Kibish, Ethiopia". Nature. 433 (7027). Springer Science and Business Media LLC: 733–736. Bibcode:2005Natur.433..733M. doi:10.1038/nature03258. ISSN 0028-0836. PMID 15716951. S2CID 1454595.
  7. ^ Parfitt, Simon A.; Barendregt, René W.; Breda, Marzia; Candy, Ian; Collins, Matthew J.; et al. (2005). "The earliest record of human activity in northern Europe". Nature. 438 (7070). Springer Science and Business Media LLC: 1008–1012. Bibcode:2005Natur.438.1008P. doi:10.1038/nature04227. ISSN 0028-0836. PMID 16355223. S2CID 4362294.
  8. ^ Hirsch, J. E. (2005-11-15). "An index to quantify an individual's scientific research output". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 102 (46): 16569–16572. arXiv:physics/0508025. Bibcode:2005PNAS..10216569H. doi:10.1073/pnas.0507655102. PMC 1283832. PMID 16275915.
  9. ^ Dove, Alan (April 2005). "Maurice Hilleman". Nature Medicine. 11 (4): S2. doi:10.1038/nm1223. ISSN 1546-170X. PMID 15812484. S2CID 13028372.