Ampere Atomic theory

It was reserved to Gerhardt to clearly establish the distinction between atom and molecule to obsetwe the bearing of the discoveries of Avogadro and Ampere upon chemical philosophy and thus to establish the atomic theory as entertained at present. 

Mauskopf, Seymour H. "The Atomic Structural Theories of Ampere and Gau-din Molecular Speculation and Avogadro s Hypothesis." Isis 60 (1969) 61-74. 

In his partly theoretical memoir On the conditions of certain elements at the moment of chemical change , Brodie supposed that every combination is the consequence of a decomposition, and this can only be occasioned by new combinations. He refers to Ampere s hypothesis that molecules of oxygen, etc., contain two atoms, and says the nascent state is atomic. At the moment of chemical change, a chemical difference exists between the particles of which certain elementary bodies consist, perfectly the same in kind to that which exists between the particles of compound substances under similar circumstances, and on which the phenomena of combination and decomposition depend. It is generally called affinity and the electrochemical theory states that the two particles are to one another in a positive and negative electrical relation . He does not specifically relate it to an electrical state but calls the particles chemically polar . 

Nernst applied the atomistic theory of electricity to chemistry, calling the unit charges positive and negative electrons, and , which combine with atoms or radicals to form ions. He had the idea that and 0 combine to form a neutral particle constituting the ether of space (Ampere had suggested this). In his last years Nernst devoted much time to cosmological speculations. 

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