1900

On 12 December, Guglielmo Marconi carries out the first transatlantic radio transmission, between Poldhu, in Cornwall, and Signal Hill at St. John's, Newfoundland. He received the 1909 Nobel Prize in Physics.

At the Universal Exposition in Turin, the M1 is presented, the first Italian typewriter, produced in the company's limited partnership "Ing. Olivetti et Compagnia," established in Ivrea on the initiative of Camillo Olivetti, for designing and producing typewriters.

On 18 November, the National Research Council (CNR) is established as a nonprofit organization, charged with, among other things, "coordinating and stimulating national activity in the various branches of science and its applications." Among the founders is mathematician Vito Volterra, first president and pioneer of functional analysis and biomathematics.

In academic year 1927-28 in Rome, Enrico Fermi, with support from Orso Mario Corbino, assembles a group of young men: Franco Rasetti, Emilio Segré, Edoardo Amaldi, and Ettore Majorana, who pass from engineering to physics. These will become "I Ragazzi di Via Panisperna"; (the Via Panisperna boys), students of the so-called "Fermi school," joined later by Bruno Pontecorvo and Oscar D'Agostino.

Mauro Picone founds the Istituto di Calcolo Numerico (Institute of Numerical Calculus) at the Università di Napoli (University of Naples). In 1960 in Rome he obtains the foundation of the Istituto Nazionale per le Applicazioni del Calcolo (INAC; National Institute for Applied Calculus) within the National Research Council (CNR), later transformed into the Istituto per le Applicazioni del Calcolo (IAC; Institute for Applied Calculus).

Ugo Cerletti and Lucio Bini conduct the first electroshock experiment for psychiatric therapy on a man, a confused vagabond from Milan, at the clinic for nervous and mental diseases at the Università di Roma (University of Rome).

On 10 December the Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded to Enrico Fermi, who accepts the prize, but then, in protest against the racial laws in Italy that would have impacted his wife, leaves for Canada, from where he then reaches the USA.

At the XI National Radio exhibition at the Milan Trade Fair, experimental television systems are presented, produced by Marelli Laboratory and developed by Francesco Vecchiacchi of the Politecnico di Milano (Milan Polytechnic University). In 1952 the engineer builds a radio and television bridge, the first broadband connection.

Ida Bianco and her husband Ezio Silvestroni identify the new disease of microcythemia as the primary cause of thalassemia.

Neurobiologist Rita Levi Montalcini discovers a factor that stimulates the growth of nerve fibers. In 1986 she receives the Nobel Prize for her discoveries in neurophysiology.

The Comitato Nazionale per le Ricerche Nucleari (CNRN; National Committee for Nuclear Research) is founded on 26 June, chaired by Francesco Giordani and with the collaboration of physicists including Edoardo Amaldi, Bruno Ferretti, Enrico Medi, the vice-president of Finelettrica, Arnaldo Mario Angelini, and the young geologist Felice Ippolito. In 1960 it becomes the Comitato Nazionale per l'Energia Nucleare (CNEN; National Committee for Nuclear Energy).

The first numerical electronic computer is put into operation at the Politecnico di Milano (Milan Polytechnic University): the CRC-102, acquired through funds from the Marshall Plan and built by the Computer Research Corporation of California.

The National Laboratories of the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN; National Institute for Nuclear Physics) are born in Frascati, the first Italian research facility for the study of nuclear and subnuclear physics. The first Italian accelerator was built in 1957 under the direction of Giorgio Salvini, the 1.1 GeV electrosynchrotron.

Emilio Segré together with Owen Chamberlain succeed in producing and recognizing the antiproton; for the results obtained, they receive the 1959 Nobel Prize for Physics.

The Elea 9003 automatic electronic computer, the first electronic computer made in Italy, is presented by Olivetti. It is considered a technologically advanced product by reason of the innovative solutions adopted.

Giulio Natta is awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the production of isotactic polypropylene, a polymer that is marketed by Montecatini under the name of Moplen and Meraklon.

Renato Dulbecco, K. Temin, and D. Baltimore are awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine for discovering the action of oncogenic viruses in the cell.

Construction begins for the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso (LNGS; Gran Sasso National Laboratories). The idea of providing the INFN with a large underground laboratory dedicated to sub-nuclear physics was conceived in 1979, thanks to Professor Antonino Zichichi, then president of the INFN.

The Agenzia Spaziale Italiana (Italian Space Agency) is established for research in the sector of space science in satellite technologies and for developing means of exploring the cosmos.

The Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (INGV; National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology) is born from the fusion of five institutes: the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica (ING; >National Institute of Geophysics), the Osservatorio Vesuviano (OV; Vesuvian Observatory), the Istituto Internazionale di Vulcanologia di Catania (IIV; International Institute of Volcanology of Catania), the Istituto di Geochimica dei Fluidi di Palermo (IGF; Institute of Fluid Geochemistry), and the Istituto di Ricerca sul Rischio Sismico di Milano (IRRS; Seismic Risk Research Institute of Milan).

In the Frascati laboratories, the collider DAφNE is created, still in operation and holding the world record for low-energy instantaneous luminosity.

In Modena, Dr. Antonio Daniele Pinna's team performs the first intestine transplant in Italy.