Beginning with the publication of Nicolaus Copernicus’s "De revolutionibus orbium coelestium", contributions to the “revolution” continued until finally ending with Isaac Newton’s work over a century later.

The Copernican Revolution started with the publishing of the book "De revolutionibus orbium coelestium" by Nicolaus Copernicus. His book proposed a heliocentric system (the sun at the centre of the solar system) versus the widely accepted geocentric system (the earth at the centre of the universe) of that time. Tycho Brahe accepted Copernicus's model but reasserted geocentricity. However, Tycho challenged the Aristotelian model when he observed a comet that went through the region of the planets. This region was said to only have uniform circular motion on solid spheres, which meant that it would be impossible for a comet to enter into the area. Johannes Kepler followed Tycho and developed the three laws of planetary motion. Kepler would not have been able to produce his laws without the observations of Tycho, because they allowed Kepler to prove that planets travelled in ellipses, and that the Sun does not sit directly in the centre of an orbit but off to the side. Galileo Galilei came after Kepler and developed his own telescope with enough magnification to allow him to study Venus and discover that it has phases like a moon. The discovery of the phases of Venus was one of the more influential reasons for the transition from geocentrism to heliocentrism. Sir Isaac Newton's "Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica" concluded the Copernican Revolution. The development of his laws of planetary motion and universal gravitation explained the presumed motion related to the heavens by asserting a gravitational force of attraction between two objects.