Francesco Maurolico (16.09.1494-21.07.1575) was an Italian mathematician, physicist and astronomer. He was born in Messina. He was a priest and a teacher of mathematics in Messina, and from 1569 professor at the university in Messina.
His research in physics concerned optics. He studied the rectilinear propagation of light, its reflection from plane, spherical, cylindrical and conical mirrors and its refraction, observed spherical aberration and studied the rainbow. He showed that convex lenses are converging and concave ones diverging, and that light rays passing through a plate with plane-parallel faces do not change their direction but are merely displaced parallel to themselves. He explained the rainbow, was the first to point out its seven colours, and studied the refraction of light in prisms and the anatomy of the eye. While accepting Alhazen's theory of vision, he nevertheless held that light rays are refracted in the crystalline lens of the eye as in a lens and give rise to the sensation of sight on the retina. He was the first to explain the cause of short-sightedness and long-sightedness of the eye, seeing it respectively in an excessive or an insufficient curvature of the crystalline lens, and he explained the principle of the camera obscura. He gave an explanation of the action of spectacles. He published the works of Apollonius of Perga and Archimedes.