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In 1746–1748, Benjamin Franklin experimented with charging Leyden jars in series, [23] and developed a system involving 11 panes of glass with thin lead plates glued on each side, and then connected together. He used the term "electrical battery" to describe his electrostatic battery in a 1749 letter about his electrical research in 1748.
Franklin's experiments with Leyden jars progressed to connecting several Leyden jars together in a series, with "one hanging on the tail of the other". All of the jars in the series could be charged simultaneously, which multiplied the electrical effect. [31] A similar apparatus had been created earlier by Daniel Gralath.
The experiment was first proposed in 1752 by Benjamin Franklin, who reportedly conducted the experiment with the assistance of his son William. The experiment's purpose was to investigate the nature of lightning and electricity, which were not yet understood. Combined with further experiments on the ground, the kite experiment demonstrated that ...
Benjamin Franklin. Benjamin Franklin promoted his investigations of electricity and theories through the famous, though extremely dangerous, experiment of having his son fly a kite through a storm-threatened sky. A key attached to the kite string sparked and charged a Leyden jar, thus establishing the link between lightning and electricity. [51]
Benjamin Franklin's experiment with bells and a lightning rod has remained a popular example of electric phenomena in modern times. The experiment has been adapted and updated, and is now commonly used in classrooms and demonstrations to illustrate a variety of concepts related to electricity.
German physicist Ewald Georg von Kleist and Dutch scientist Pieter van Musschenbroek invented Leyden jars. 1752: American scientist Benjamin Franklin showed that lightning was electrical by flying a kite and explained how Leyden jars work. 1780: Italian scientist Luigi Galvani discovered Galvanic action in living tissue. 1785
Franklin was able to apply this thinking by explaining unexplained phenomena of the time, such as the Leyden jar, a basic charge storing device similar to a capacitor. He argued that the wire and inner surface became positively charged, while the outer surface became negatively charged.
Many experimenters took to hooking several Leyden jars together to create a stronger charge and one of them, the colonial American inventor Benjamin Franklin, may have been the first to call his grouping an "electrical battery", a play on the military term for weapons functioning together. [1] [2]