The Atlantic recently assembled a panel of 12 scientists, entrepreneurs, engineers, historians of technology and others to assess the innovations that have done the most to shape the nature of modern life. The panel ultimately came up with a list of the 50 greatest breakthroughs since the wheel, seven of which were related specifically to agriculture. Here they are in slideshow above.
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1. Nitrogen fixation, 1918 (No. 11 overall)
The German chemist Fritz Haber, also the father of chemical weapons, won a Nobel Prize for his development of the ammonia-synthesis process, which was used to create a new class of fertilizers central to the green revolution (No. 2).
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2. The green revolution, mid-20th century (No. 22 overall)
Combining technologies like synthetic fertilizers (No. 1) and scientific plant breeding (No. 6) hugely increased the world’s food output. Norman Borlaug (pictured on right in a field of improved wheat), the agricultural economist who devised this approach, has been credited with saving more than 1 billion people from starvation.
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3. The moldboard plow, 18th century (No. 30 overall)
The first plow that not only dug soil up but turned it over, allowing for the cultivation of harder ground. Without it, agriculture as we know it would not exist in northern Europe or the American Midwest.
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4. Archimedes’ screw, third century b.c. (No. 31 overall)
The Greek scientist is believed to have designed one of the first water pumps, a rotating corkscrew that pushed water up a tube. It transformed irrigation (especially for agriculture) and remains in use today at many sewage-treatment plants.
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5. The cotton gin, 1793 (No. 32 overall)
Institutionalized the cotton industry — and slavery — in the American South.
Humans have been manipulating plant species for nearly as long as we’ve grown them, but it wasn’t until early-20th-century scientists discovered a forgotten 1866 paper by the Austrian botanist Gregor Mendel that we figured out how plant breeding — and, later on, human genetics — worked.
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7. The combine harvester, 1930s (No. 50 overall)
Mechanized the farm, freeing people to do new types of work.
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1. Nitrogen fixation, 1918 (No. 11 overall)
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2. The green revolution, mid-20th century (No. 22 overall)
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3. The moldboard plow, 18th century (No. 30 overall)
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4. Archimedes’ screw, third century b.c. (No. 31 overall)
November 8, 2013 
