Chart of solar system with path of Halley's comet in 1835 and positions of some of the Asteroids (Planetoids) discovered up to 1857. Educational plate c1857

Reconstruction of Java Man (Pithecanthropus erectus) based on skull cap, thigh bone and 2 back teeth discovered in Pliocene fossil beds in Trinil, Central Java, by Dr Eugene Dubois in 1894

Victoria Regia, the giant South American waterlily discovered by Robert Hermann Schomburgk (1804-1865), British traveller and explorer, during an expedition in British Guiana, with Humming Birds. Coloured engraving, London, 1874.

David Rittenhouse (1732-1796), American astronomer and inventor. He introduced spider's web as cross-hairs in telescopes and measuring instruments. He discovered the atmosphere of the planet Venus. Engraving 1896.

Skeleton of Mammoth discovered in 1817 by Dr Mitchell of New York at Goschen, Orange County and later assembled in the Philadelphia Museum. From Simeon Shaw "Nature Displayed", London, 1823. Lithograph

John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh (1842-1919) British physicist. Nobel Prize for Physics 1904. Discovered the element Argon, one of the noble (inert) gases. Cartoon from "Vanity Fair", London, December 1899

Luigi Galvani (1737-1798) Italian physiologist, c1762. Galvani discovered animal electricity, voltaic or galvanic electricity, when investigating contraction of muscles in legs of dead frogs From "Le Journal de la Jeunesse" (Paris, 1880) Engraving

Iguanadon (herbivorous dinosaur) fossils discovered by Jules Creteur in coal mine, Bernissart, Belgium 1878. He and his workmates uncovered 39 Iguanadon skeletons. Wood engraving c1880

Woolly Mammoth (Mammuthis) skeleton, approximately 3m (9ft) high 5.5m (16ft) long, discovered in the ice in Siberia in 1799. Extinct genus of elephant from Pleistocene Epoch (2,500,000 to 10,000 years ago) found in fossil deposits and in northern Europe

Jons Jacob Berezelius (1779-1848), Swedish scientist & chemist, c1890. Berzelius introduced modern chemical symbols and he discovered the elements selenium, thorium and cerium. He accurately determined atomic weights.

Emperor penguin (Aptenodytes forsteri) from a recently discovered colony on Snowy Hill in the Weddell Sea. This may be the northernmost Emperor penguin colony in Antarctica.

Emperor penguin (Aptenodytes forsteri) from a recently discovered colony on Snowy Hill in the Weddell Sea. This may be the northernmost Emperor penguin colony in Antarctica.