Hans Christian Ørsted, Danish physicist and chemist (b. 1777)
Hans Christian Ørsted ( UR-sted, Danish: [ˈhænˀs ˈkʰʁestjæn ˈɶɐ̯steð] (listen); often rendered Oersted in English; 14 August 1777 – 9 March 1851) was a Danish physicist and chemist who discovered that electric currents create magnetic fields, which was the first connection found between electricity and magnetism. Oersted's law and the oersted unit (Oe) are named after him.

A leader of the Danish Golden Age, Ørsted was a close friend of Hans Christian Andersen and the brother of politician and jurist Anders Sandøe Ørsted, who served as Prime Minister of Denmark from 1853 to 1854.