Guericke, Otto

Guericke, Otto von (1602-1686) German scientist, inventor, and politician his major scientific achievement was the establishment of the physics of vacuums he served as the mayor of Magdeburg from 1646 to 1676. 

Early in the 17th century, there was still vigorous disagreement as to the feasibility of empty space Descartes denied the possibility of a vacuum. The matter was put to the test for the first time by Otto von Guericke (1602-1686), a German politician who devoted his brief leisure to scientific experimentation (Krafft 1970-1980). He designed a crude suction pump using a cylinder and piston and two flap valves, and... 

Krafft, F. (1970-1980) Article on Otto von Guericke, in Dictionary of Scientific Biography, vol. 5, ed. Gillispie, C.C. (Charles Scribner s Sons, New York) p. 574. 

The earliest information dealing with this phenomenon dates back to 600 B.c. It was found that a piece of amber after it had been rubbed was able to attract small fibers. More recent observations are from the 17th century, when William Gilbert noticed that amber, sulfur, and other dielectrics charged by friction could attract smoke. Similar observations were made by Boyle (1675) and Otto von Guericke (1672). Francis Hauksbee (1709) reported that he had discovered a phenomenon which is now called ionic wind or electric wind. Ionic wind and the glow from the corona discharge was discussed by Isaac Newton (1718). 

Institut fur Pharmakologie und Toxirologic Otto-von-Guericke-Universitat Magdeburg, Magdeburg, Germany... 

Rosyid, O.A., System-Analytic Safety Evaluation of the Hydrogen Cycle for Energetic Utilization, Dissertation, Otto-von-Guericke University, Magdeburg, Germany, 2006. 

Chemisches Institut der Otto-von-Guericke-Universitat, Magdeburg, Universitatsplatz 2,... 

Our own work described in this report was generously supported by the Deutsche Forschungsge-meinschaft within the Schwerpunktprogramm Spezifische Phanomene in der Silicium-Chemie. This support is most gratefully acknowledged. Special thanks are also due to my co-workers whose names appear in the list of references and to the Otto-von-Guericke-Universitat and the Fonds der Chemischen Industrie for financial support. 

The Burgomaster of the city, Otto von Guericke, was then performing the Magdeburg miracles with the evacuated hemispheres which sixteen horses could not separate and with his curious barometer, the little man who remained hidden in a tube when the weather was to be... 

To the growing number of materially minded experimentalists, here was a new opportunity for investigation. Chief among these was Robert Boyle, who with Robert Hooke (1635-1703) created improved versions of Otto von Guericke s air pump, with which they were able to produce vacuums in spaces more convenient than the small tubes above columns of mercury. 

The scientific publications of Boyle began in 1660 with his extensive treatise on the Spring of the Air, in which he made use of an improvement on the air pump discovered by Otto von Guericke,—his newly discovered pneumatic engine. This was a very important contribution to the physics of air, in the course of which ho announced the generalization still called Boyle s Law and sometimes called Marriott s Law, though Marriott announced it some seventeen years later. 

Vacuum means empty space in Latin. Vacuum does not contain even air. Otto Von Guericke conducted an interesting experiment in 1640 to demonstrate the effect of atmospheric pressure when air is removed from a container. 

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