Plans to digitise Newton's handwritten Principia going ahead

Cambridge University is to give the public access to Sir Isaac Newton's own annotated copy of the Principia Mathematica online, along with several of his other papers. Newton, born on Christmas Day in 1642, shares credit with Gottfried Leibniz for the developments in integral and differential calculus, along with several breakthroughs in mathematics and physics.

The "Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica", published in 1687, is a work outlining Newton's laws of motion, his law of universal gravitation, a derivation of Kepler's laws of planetary motion and discussion of various other prominent fields. Currently, more than 4000 pages have been uploaded as part of a Cambridge University Library programme which aims to open up access to papers of famous scientists to the public.

Grant Young, Cambridge University Library's digitisation manager, said that "you can see Newton's mind at work in the calculations and how his thinking was developing", noting "the book has suffered much, pages are badly burned or water-stained, so it is very delicate and rarely put on show". The online publication of these documents with their original annotations allows the public to see Newton and his initial understanding of calculus. Young added: "Before today anyone who wanted to see these things had to come to Cambridge and get permission to see them, but we are now bringing Cambridge University library to the world at the click of a mouse".

Charles Darwin's papers are also being published separately online but will eventually become part of this digital project, which has received an initial grant of £1.5 million from the Polonsky charitable foundation, supporting research and higher education.