Ibn Zuhr, known in the West as Avenzoar, was one of the greatest physicians, clinicians and parasitologists of the Middle Ages.

Algebra. Even the word is enough to strike terror into the hearts of junior high and high school students the world over – not to mention send shivers of apprehension down the backs of their parents as they start the process of solving for “x” or “y”, and sometimes both.

Abu Abdallah Muhammad Ibn Jabir Ibn Sinan Al-Battani Al-Harrani, known in the West as Albategnius, is considered the greatest astronomer of his time and one of the greatest during the Middle Ages. Al-Battani was born around 858 C.E. in Battan, a state of Harran, and was first educated by his father Jabir Ibn San’an Al-Battani, …

Abu Nasr Mohammad Ibn al-Farakh Al-Farabi was born to a noble family in the small village of Wasij, in the province of Farab in Turkestan, in 872 AD (259 AH). His works included several rich commentaries on Aristotle’s physics, meteorology, and logic – in addition to a large number of books on several other subjects …

Abu Zayd Hunayn bin Ishaq al Ibadi ranks as the finest medical and scientific mind of the early Abassid era. Born in 809 to an apothecary in Al Hirah, Hunayn went to Baghdad to study medicine as a young man. There he enrolled in the earliest known private medical school in Islam under the direction …

The word “alchemy” brings to mind images of pseudo-scientists huddling over bowls of liquids, mixing strange potions and dabbling in the occult. However, the true goal of alchemy was nothing less than the transmutation of the “base” (i.e., more reactive) metals into gold. Alchemists also sought a single cure for all diseases and a way …