See also: 1848 in science, other events of 1849, 1850 in science and the list of years in science.
Astronomy Edouard Roche finds the limiting radius of tidal destruction and tidal creation for a body held together only by its self gravity, called the Roche limit, and uses it to explain why Saturn's rings do not condense into a satellite Mathematics George Gabriel Stokes shows that solitary waves can arise from a combination of periodic waves Physics Hippolyte Fizeau and Léon Foucault measure the speed of light to be about 298,000 km/s Awards Copley Medal: Roderick Murchison Wollaston Medal for Geology: Joseph Prestwich Births April 25 - Felix Klein, German mathematician († 1925) October 26 - Ferdinand Georg Frobenius, German mathematician († 1917) Deaths December 12 - Marc Isambard Brunel, engineer (born 1769)
