Wilhelm Eduard Weber

Wilhelm Eduard Weber ForMemRS
Portrait of Weber by Gottlieb Biermann, 1885
Born	(1804-10-24)24 October 1804 Wittenberg, Electorate of Saxony (now Germany)
Died	23 June 1891(1891-06-23) (aged 86) Göttingen, German Empire (now Germany)
Alma mater	University of Halle University of Göttingen
Known for	c for speed of light Weber electrodynamics Electrical telegraph Weber (unit)
Father	Michael Weber
Relatives	Ernst Heinrich Weber (brother) Eduard Weber (brother)
Awards	ForMemRS (1850) Copley Medal (1859) Pour le Mérite (1859) Matteucci Medal (1879)
Scientific career
Fields	Physics
Institutions	University of Göttingen University of Halle University of Leipzig
Doctoral advisor	Johann Salomo Christoph Schweigger
Doctoral students	Ernst Abbe Friedrich Kohlrausch Eduard Riecke
Other notable students	Gottlob Frege Arthur Schuster
Signature

Wilhelm Weber House, 14,15 Schlossstrasse, Wittenberg

Memorial to Wilhelm Weber, Wittenberg Post Office

Wilhelm Eduard Weber ForMemRS (/ˈveɪbər/; German: [ˈveːbɐ]; 24 October 1804 – 23 June 1891) was a German physicist and, together with Carl Friedrich Gauss, inventor of the first electromagnetic telegraph.

Biography

Early years

Weber was born in Schlossstrasse in Wittenberg, where his father, Michael Weber, was professor of theology. The building had previously been the home of Abraham Vater.

Wilhelm was the second of three brothers, all of whom were distinguished by an aptitude for science. After the dissolution of the University of Wittenberg his father was transferred to Halle in 1815. Wilhelm had received his first lessons from his father, but was now sent to the Orphan Asylum and Grammar School at Halle. After that he entered the University, and devoted himself to natural philosophy. He distinguished himself so much in his classes, and by original work, that after taking his degree of Doctor and becoming a Privatdozent he was appointed Professor Extraordinary of natural philosophy at Halle.

Career

In 1831, on the recommendation of Carl Friedrich Gauss, he was hired by the University of Göttingen as professor of physics, at the age of twenty-seven. His lectures were interesting, instructive, and suggestive. Weber thought that, in order to thoroughly understand physics and apply it to daily life, mere lectures, though illustrated by experiments, were insufficient, and he encouraged his students to experiment themselves, free of charge, in the college laboratory. As a student of twenty years he, with his brother, Ernst Heinrich Weber, Professor of Anatomy at Leipzig, had written a book on the Wave Theory and Fluidity, which brought its authors a considerable reputation. Acoustics was a favourite science of his, and he published numerous papers upon it in Poggendorffs Annalen, Schweigger's Jahrbücher für Chemie und Physik, and the musical journal Carcilia. The 'mechanism of walking in mankind' was another study, undertaken in conjunction with his younger brother, Eduard Weber. These important investigations were published between the years 1825 and 1838. Gauss and Weber constructed the first electromagnetic telegraph in 1833, which connected the observatory with the institute for physics in Göttingen.

In December 1837, the Hanoverian government dismissed Weber, one of the Göttingen Seven, from his post at the university for political reasons. Weber then travelled for a time, visiting England, among other countries, and became professor of physics in Leipzig from 1843 to 1849, when he was reinstated at Göttingen. One of his most important works, co-authored with Carl Friedrich Gauss and Carl Wolfgang Benjamin Goldschmidt, was Atlas des Erdmagnetismus: nach den Elementen der Theorie entworfen (Atlas of Geomagnetism: Designed according to the elements of the theory), a series of magnetic maps, and it was chiefly through his efforts that magnetic observatories were instituted. He studied magnetism with Gauss, and during 1864 published his Electrodynamic Proportional Measures containing a system of absolute measurements for electric currents, which forms the basis of those in use. Weber died in Göttingen, where he is buried in the same cemetery as Max Planck and Max Born.

Weber's grave in Göttingen

He was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in 1855.

In 1855 with Rudolf Kohlrausch (1809–1858) he demonstrated that the ratio of electrostatic to electromagnetic units produced a number that matched the speed of light. This finding led to Maxwell's conjecture that light is an electromagnetic wave. This also led to Weber's development of his theory of electrodynamics. Also, the first usage of the letter "c" to denote the speed of light was in an 1856 paper by Kohlrausch and Weber.

International recognition

The SI unit of magnetic flux, the weber (symbol: Wb) is named after him.

Works

• Elektrodynamische Maaßbestimmungen : insbesondere Zurückführung der Stromintensitäts-Messungen auf mechanisches Maass (with Wilhelm Weber) 1857. "Electrodynamic Measurements, Especially Attributing Mechanical Units to Measures of Current Intensity". German text. English translation
• Akustik, Mechanik, Optik und Wärmelehre (in German). Berlin: Springer. 1892.
• Wellenlehre (in German). Berlin: Springer. 1893.
• Galvanismus und Elektrodynamik (in German). Berlin: Springer. 1894.
• Mechanik der menschlichen Gehwerkzeuge (in German). Berlin: Springer. 1894.

• 
  Wellenlehre, 1893

See also

• German inventors and discoverers
• International System of Electrical and Magnetic Units
• Bifilar coil
• Needle telegraph
• Vector magnetic potential
• Weber electrodynamics

Bibliography

• Gauss, Carl Friedrich; Weber, Wilhelm Eduard (1840). "Atlas Des Erdmagnetismus: Nach Den Elementen Der Theorie Entworfen". Leipzig: Weidmann'sche Buchhandlung. wilhelm weber. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
• G.C.F. (George Carey Foster) (1891). "Wilhelm Eduard Weber". Nature. 44 (1132). Macmillan Journals ltd.: 229–230. Bibcode:1891Natur..44..229G. doi:10.1038/044229b0. S2CID 4060786. Retrieved 16 November 2007. – obituary
• Urbanitsky, Alfred; Wormell, Richard (1886). "Electricity in the Service of Man". London: Cassell and Company: 756–758. wilhelm weber physics. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) – Telegraph of Weber and Gauss (with pictures)
• "Weber, Wilhelm Eduard". Virtual Laboratory. Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin. Retrieved 5 September 2007.
• Jackson, Myles W. (2006). Harmonious Triads: Physicists, Musicians, and Instrument Makers in Nineteenth-Century Germany. MIT Press. ISBN 0-262-27615-1.

External links

• Media related to Wilhelm Eduard Weber at Wikimedia Commons
• Texts on Wikisource:
  • "Weber, Wilhelm". New International Encyclopedia. 1905.
  • "Weber, Wilhelm Eduard". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
  • "Weber, Wilhelm Eduard". The New Student's Reference Work. 1914.
• Biography and bibliography in the Virtual Laboratory of the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science
• Wilhelm Weber's Works Translated into English A bibliography compiled by A.K.T. Assis in 21st Century Science and Technology 2009-2010
• Wilhelm Eduard Weber at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
• O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Wilhelm Eduard Weber", MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive, University of St Andrews
• Wilhelm Weber's Main Works on Electrodynamics Translated into English. Volume 1: Gauss and Weber's Absolute System of units
• Wilhelm Weber's Main Works on Electrodynamics Translated into English. Volume 2: Weber's Fundamental Force and the Unification of the Laws of Coulomb, Ampère and Faraday
• Wilhelm Weber's Main Works on Electrodynamics Translated into English. Volume 3: Measurement of Weber's Constant c, Diamagnetism, the Telegraph Equation and the Propagation of Electric Waves at Light Velocity
• Wilhelm Weber's Main Works on Electrodynamics Translated into English. Volume 4: Conservation of Energy, Weber's Planetary Model of the Atom and the Unification of Electromagnetism and Gravitation