Popular search engine Google that celebrates various doodles depending on the occasion has chosen popular mathematician and astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus’s 540th birthday .
The doodle depicted the planets Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn (that were known at that time) revolving around the Sun and the Moon revolving around the Earth.
Google celebrated the occasion by featuring an animated Google doodle. Copernicus was famous for proposing the heliocentric theory that stated that the Earth revolves around the Sun.
Many religious institutions and leaders at that time, believed that the Earth was the centre of the Universe and that Sun revolves around the Earth. This belief has been termed Geocentrism.
Copernicus published heliocentric theory draft before 1514 and shared with a group of friends .Later he improved his theory by mathematical calculations and observing astronomical bodies.
By 1532 Copernicus had completed his work but refused to have this published. He shared his work in his inner circle as he did not want to be scorned.
Georg Joachim Rheticus, a mathematician, came in 1539 to live with Copernicus. He stayed for two years and published a book outlining Copernicus theory’s essence.
When it was well received he convinced Copernicus and published De revolutionibus. Copernicus woke from a stroke-induced coma, when the first print was placed and looked at his book. He then died peacefully.