Science and technology in Iran

Iran has made considerable advances in science and technology through education and training, despite international sanctions in almost all aspects of research during the past 30 years. Iran's university population swelled from 100,000 in 1979 to 2 million in 2006. In recent years, the growth in Iran's scientific output is reported to be the fastest in the world. Islamic scienceInventions in medieval IslamTimeline of Islamic science and technology and Academy of Gundishapur Beginning in ancient times Persia has been a center of scientific achievement and was often the conduit of knowledge from China and India in the East to Greece and Rome in the West. Persian-speaking scholars have been active in furthering knowledge in fields of science and technology, such as astronomy, chemistry, anatomy, biology, botany, cosmology, mathematics, engineering, and architecture. Science in Persia evolved in two main phases separated by the arrival and widespread adoption of Islam in the region. References to scientific subjects such as natural science and mathematics occur in books written in the Pahlavi languages. The Qanat (a water management system used for irrigation) originated in pre-Achaemenid Iran. The oldest and largest known qanat is in the Iranian city of Gonabad, which, after 2,700 years, still provides drinking and agricultural water to nearly 40,000 people. Iranian philosophers and inventors may have created the first batteries (sometimes known as the Baghdad Battery) in the Parthian or Sasanian eras. Some have suggested that the batteries may have been used medicinally. Other scientists believe the batteries were used for electroplating—transferring a thin layer of metal to another metal surface—a technique still used today and the focus of a common classroom experiment. Windwheels were developed by the Babylonians ca. 1700 BC to pump water for irrigation. The horizontal or panemone windmill first appeared in Greater Iran during the 9th century.