Adolph Theodor Kupffer

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Adolph Kupffer, lithograph by Rudolf Hoffmann , 1856

Adolph Theodor Kupffer (* 7 January July / 18 January  1799 greg. In Mitau , Courland ; † 23 May July / 4 June  1865 greg. In Saint Petersburg ) was a German-Baltic physicist and physical chemist .

Life

Kupffer's tomb in Saint Petersburg

Adolph Theodor Kupffer was born as the son of the businessman Jacob Leonhard Kupffer and his wife Constantia, b. Brandt, born. He attended grammar school in Mitau, studied medicine at the University of Dorpat in 1815 and 1816 , from 1816 to 1819 in Berlin preferably mineralogy with Christian Samuel Weiß , then chemistry with Friedrich Stromeyer in Göttingen and received his doctorate there in 1821. He went to Paris, where he worked with René-Just Haüy in 1821 and 1822 , in particular on the prize task set up by the Berlin Academy of Sciences on the precise measurement of angles on crystals and won the prize; he later published this work in Berlin in 1826. Appointed professor of physics and chemistry at the University of Kazan , he took up this position in 1824 and was made a full member of the Academy of Sciences in Saint Petersburg in 1828 for the subject of mineralogy, which he exchanged for physics in 1840. In 1840 he was elected a corresponding member of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences .

In 1828 Kupffer undertook a research trip to the Ural Mountains , where he met the Hansteen - Ermanschen magnetic-astronomical-meteorological expedition. After his return he held offices at various technical state schools, but in 1829 the Academy assigned him as a scientific companion, together with Johann Georg Lenz and Édouard Ménétries, on General Immanuel's expedition to the interior of the Caucasus and Elbrus .

The relationship that Kupffer had established with Arago during his stay in Paris was continued in Kazan by the fact that both of them made astronomical observations in correspondence. In the process, Kupffer discovered and determined the influence of temperature on the magnetic force in magnetic bars. When in 1830 the Academy of St. Petersburg had a geomagnetic observatory built there at his request , he resumed these observations there. Through his efforts, a magnetic-meteorological observation network was organized over the whole of Russia through the establishment of observatories, the top of which was a central physical observatory in Saint Petersburg since 1843. In 1848, Kupffer was appointed director. He continued his teaching activity until 1851, after which he only lived his scientific research.

In addition to his numerous works on meteorology and geomagnetism , Kupffer directed the establishment of storm signals along the Russian coasts. His research on aerometry prompted the introduction of a new alcoholometer in Russia. The results of his work on the latter subject are recorded in the Handbuch der Alcoholometry (Berlin 1865).

When Kupffer was about to go on a trip abroad, he died on June 4, 1865 of pneumonia at the age of 66 in Saint Petersburg. In this city he was buried in the Smolensk cemetery.

Fonts

  • Travel to the area around Elborus . St. Petersburg 1830
  • About the sulfur in Poggendorf, Ann. II. 1824
  • Vitriol ibid. VIII. 1826; "Adular" ibid. XIII. 1828
  • Manual of calc. Crystallonomy . Petersburg 1831
  • Improvements to the reflection goniometer , Poggendorff, Ann. XXVII. 1833.
  • Price report on the influence of heat on the elasticity of solid bodies, especially metals , in the Mém, de l'Acad. de St. Pétersbourg, Scienc. math. et phys. VI. 1857.

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Holger Krahnke: The members of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen 1751-2001 (= Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Philological-Historical Class. Volume 3, Vol. 246 = Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Mathematical-Physical Class. Episode 3, vol. 50). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2001, ISBN 3-525-82516-1 , p. 142.
personal data
SURNAME Kupffer, Adolph Theodor
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Russian physicist and chemist
DATE OF BIRTH January 18, 1799
PLACE OF BIRTH Mitau , Courland
DATE OF DEATH June 4, 1865
Place of death St. Petersburg