The disagreement between Volta and Galvani became a significant matter of debate at the time, with opposing camps aligning themselves with one scientist or the other. Both, however, were partly correct: muscular contractions are stimulated by electricity as suggested by Galvani and contact between dissimilar metals can produce a current as proposed by Volta.
While attempting to prove his own theory, Volta experimented with various metals and electrolytes, eventually producing the voltaic pile. The pile consisted of a series of discs of zinc and copper later other metals were used arranged vertically and separated by pieces of cloth or cardboard soaked in an acid or salt solution. Glass rods provided support to the discs, the number of which Volta varied to produce stronger or weaker charges.
In Volta announced his invention of a device that could continuously generate an electrical current, and the voltaic pile was enthusiastically received. In , he retired to a family estate in the country. He died on March 5, In , the term volt was officially adopted in his honor to designate the unit of electric potential and electromotive force.
Alessandro Volta. Category: Pioneers. Volta found that different types of metal could change the amount of current produced, and that he could increase the current by adding disks to the stack. In a letter dated March 20, , addressed to Joseph Banks, president of the Royal Society of London, Volta first reported the electric pile. The battery was a huge success. Not only did it swing the scientific community to his side in the debate with Galvani, it was immediately recognized as a useful device.
In William Nicholson and Anthony Carlisle used the current generated by a battery to decompose water into hydrogen and oxygen. Sir Humphry Davy also studied the same chemical effect. In the s Michael Faraday used a battery in his groundbreaking studies of electromagnetism.
Napoleon was impressed by the voltaic pile as well, and recommended many honors for Volta, including making him a count in The invention of the battery brought him great renown, but Volta seems to have preferred a quiet life, and soon gave up most of his research and teaching.
He spent his last years living in a country house, where he died on March 5, , at age APS News Archives. Librarians Authors Referees Media Students. Login Become a Member Contact Us. March 20, Volta describes the Electric Battery Alessandro Volta In the late 18 th century, scientists were fascinated with electricity. A Voltaic Pile When a wire was connected to both ends of the pile, a steady current flowed. The original voltaic pile consisted of a pile of zinc and silver discs and between alternate discs, a piece of cardboard that had been soaked in saltwater.
A wire connecting the bottom zinc disc to the top silver disc could produce repeated sparks. No frogs were injured in the production of a voltaic pile. When Luigi Galvani's experiments with "animal electricity" were published , Volta began experiments that led him to theorize that animal tissue was not necessary for conduction of electricity. Proof of this theory was the batt ery, which Volta invented in He built in the first electrical pile, or batt ery: a series of metal disks of two kinds, separated by cardboard disks soaked with acid or salt solutions.
This is the basis of all modern wet-cell batt eries, and it was a tremendously important scientific discovery, because it was the first method found for the generation of a sustained electrical current. Volta built different piles using thirty, forty or sixty elements. This enabled him to study the action of the pile on the electric fluid, depending on the number of elements, and he confirmed that the electric shock increased in intensity with the number of elements used in the pile.
If more than twenty elements were used, it became painful.
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