The Royal Society- Digital Journal Archive freely available to view until 30 July 2010!

The Royal Society, the national academy of science of the UK - Digital Journal Archive freely available to view until 30 July 2010!

To access the archive, visit: http://royalsocietypublishing.org/journals

About: The archive dates back to 1665 and contains in excess of 68,000 articles, from the first ever article published in our oldest journal Philosophical Transactions to the most recent interdisciplinary article published in our youngest journal Interface Focus.

The Archive provides a record of some key scientific discoveries from the last 340 years including: Halley's description of 'his comet' in 1705; details of the double Helix of DNA by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1954; and Edmond Stone's breakthrough in 1763 that willow bark cured fevers, leading to the discovery of salicylic acid and later the development of aspirin. It also contains papers documenting the discovery of new planets, the first descriptions of organisms through a microscope, and the first account of photography. Early papers contain fascinating descriptions of how Captain James Cook preserved the health of his crew aboard the HMS Endeavour and the astonishment of 18th century Society at the performance of an eight year-old Mozart.

Some of the more obscure papers explore rudimentary prototypes of modern day technology: trials proposed by Robert Boyle in 1665 hypothesize on the possibilities of blood transfusions, pondering 'whether a fierce dog stocked with the blood of a cowardly dog may not become more tame?', whilst a forerunner for ventilators was discussed in a paper by Robert Hooke in 1667 entitled 'An account of an experiment made by Mr Hook (sic), of preserving animals alive by blowing through their lungs with bellows.'

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