December 2 – At the University of Utah, 61-year-old retired dentist Barney Clark becomes the first person to receive a permanent artificial heart; he lives for 112 days with the device.
Atomic Energy of Canada creates Therac-25, a radiation treatment for cancer patients to remove tumors; however the treatment causes 6 deaths between 1985-87 after people are seriously burned by the number of rads: the correct dose of rads is 200-1,000 rads but Therac-25 has 15,000-20,000 rads which is fatal. It is no longer used after 1987.
Physics
The Sakuma–Hattori equation is first proposed by Fumihiro Sakuma, Akira Ono and Susumu Hattori.
Psychology
The Foundations of Ethology is published by Konrad Lorenz.