11th Century

Ibn al-Haytham demonstrated in the 11th century that light travels in straight lines, and that we see not by our eyes throwing light onto objects but by the light reflecting off objects and entering our eye. He devised a dark room to show that light passing through a tiny hole in one side would project an image of the object (upside down) on a white wall inside the room, thus paving the way for the camera. His book remained the most important book on optics for over 500 years and was translated into Latin and published in 1572 as Opticae Thesaurus.

Ibn Sina, known in Europe as Avicenna, wrote al-Qanun Fi al-Tibb (The Canon of Medicine) in the 11th century. It is still one of the most important medical books ever written. After it was translated into Latin in the 12th century it served as one of the key Medical textbooks in Europe for nearly 600 years.

Al-Biruni, a famous Muslim scholar of the 11th century, worked out that the earth is round and calculated its circumference. He also stated that the earth spins on its axis and rotates around the sun, nearly six hundred years before Galileo.