Physicist Wilhelm Conrad Rontgen (above) (1845-1923) became the
first person to observe X-rays, a significant scientific advancement
that would ultimately benefit a variety of fields, most of all medicine,
by making the invisible visible. Rontgen’s discovery occurred
accidentally in his Wurzburg, Germany, lab, where he was testing
whether cathode rays could pass through glass when he noticed
a glow coming from a nearby chemically coated screen. He dubbed
the rays that caused this glow X-rays because of their because of
their unknown nature.