1. Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) – great English scientist and philosopher, one of the founders of modern physics and mathematics. He formulated the principal laws of mechanics, gravitation and optics, discovered many new optical effects. He is the founder (simultaneous with Leibnitz but independent from him) of differential and integral calculus. His main publication is “Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica” (1687), where he formulated the famous basic laws of mechanics.
2. R. Hooke (1635-1703) – outstanding English experimentalist, physicist and architect. He invented or improved different scientific devices and formulated several basic concepts of modern mechanics. However his publications are very scarce and this is the reason why his achievements are not as well known as they are worthy.
3. Ueber die Elasticität der Seidenfäden
4. W. Thomson (Lord Kelvin) (1824-1907) – British physicist, one of the pioneers in the field of thermodynamics, an author of numerous studies on the theory of electricity and magnetism. He also introduced the idea of “viscosity of metals” supposing that even such typical solids as metals can have inherent friction (viscosity).