A central figure in the foundation of modern physics, mathematics, optics, and the scientific method, Sir Isaac Newton (1642–1727) was born in the Lincolnshire hamlet of Woolsthorpe on December 25. Newton matriculated at Trinity College, Cambridge in 1661, receiving there his B.A. (1665) and M.A. degrees (1668). He became a Fellow of the College in 1667, and in 1669, at the age of twenty-six, was appointed Lucasian Professor of Mathematics. Election to the Royal Society followed in 1672. In 1696 Newton relocated to London, where he became Warden and then Master of the Royal Mint.

Sir Isaac Newton, 1642–1727. An English scientist and mathematician, Newton made major contributions in mathematics and theoretical and experimental physics and achieved a remarkable synthesis of the work of his predecessors on the laws of motion, especially the law of universal gravitation. (© Bettmann/Corbis.)