Hermann Fritz (polar light researcher)

Hermann Fritz (born September 3, 1830 in Bingen am Rhein , † August 16, 1893 in Zurich ) was a German-Swiss polar light researcher .

He studied at the TH Darmstadt and from 1859 was initially an assistant teacher for technical drawing at the Eidgenössisches Polytechnikum in Zurich . In 1872 he became titular professor there and read about general engineering.

In addition, he worked with Rudolf Wolf on questions of solar-terrestrial physics. In 1862 he was able to prove that there is a close, quantitative relationship between the frequency of auroras and the number of sunspots . There was later a dispute over priorities with Elias Loomis . He also examined the geographical distribution of the aurora borealis in the northern hemisphere and introduced the term isochasms (curves of the same frequency of auroras ).

Publications

• Directory of observed northern lights, compiled by Fritz. 1873
• The Northern Lights. 1881
• Utilization of fuels. 1876
• Agricultural Machinery Manual. 1880
• Mutual relationships of physical and chemical properties of chemical elements and compounds. 1892

literature

• Thomas Fuchs: Fritz, Hermann. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland ., 2006
• Max Waldmeier :  Fritz, Hermann. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 5, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1961, ISBN 3-428-00186-9 , p. 631 ( digitized version ).
• Wilfried Schröder: Hermann Fritz and the foundation of auroral research. In: Planetary and Space Science. Volume 46, No. 4, April 1998, pp. 461-463 doi : 10.1016 / S0032-0633 (97) 00163-3

Individual evidence

1. ↑ dgg-online.de: On the history of geophysics ( Memento of the original from June 13, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , February 29, 2008 
2. ↑ Meyers Konversationslexikon: Isochasms