Alessandro Giuseppe Antonio Anastasio Volta was an Italian physicist known for the invention
of the battery in the 1800s.
Early life and works Volta was born in Como, a town in present-day
northern Italy on February 18, 1745.
In 1774, he became a professor of physics at the Royal School in Como.
A year later, he improved and popularized the electrophorus, a device that produced
static electricity.
His promotion of it was so extensive that he is often credited with its invention, even
though a machine operating on the same principle was described in 1762 by the Swedish experimenter
Johan Wilcke.
In the years between 1776–78, Volta studied the chemistry of gases.
He discovered methane after reading a paper by Benjamin Franklin of America on "flammable
air", and Volta searched for it carefully in Italy.
In November 1776, he found methane at Lake Maggiore, and by 1778 he managed to isolate
methane.
He devised experiments such as the ignition of methane by an electric spark in a closed
vessel.
Volta also studied what we now call electrical capacitance, developing separate means to
study both electrical potential and charge, and discovering that for a given object, they
are proportional.
This may be called Volta's Law of capacitance, and it was for this work the unit of electrical
potential has been named the volt.
In 1779 he became a professor of experimental physics at the University of Pavia, a chair
that he occupied for almost 40 years.
In 1794, Volta married an aristocratic lady also from Como, Teresa Peregrini, with whom
he raised three sons: Giovanni, Flaminio and Zanino.
Volta and Galvani
Luigi Galvani discovered something he named "animal electricity" when two different metals
were connected in series with the frog's leg and to one another.
Volta realized that the frog's leg served as both a conductor of electricity and as
a detector of electricity.
He replaced the frog's leg with brine-soaked paper, and detected the flow of electricity
by other means familiar to him from his previous studies.
In this way he discovered the electrochemical series, and the law that the electromotive
force of a galvanic cell, consisting of a pair of metal electrodes separated by electrolyte,
is the difference between their two electrode potentials.
This may be called Volta's Law of the electrochemical series.
In 1800 as the result of a professional disagreement over the galvanic response advocated by Galvani,
he invented the voltaic pile, an early electric battery, which produced a steady electric
current.
Volta had determined that the most effective pair of dissimilar metals to produce electricity
was zinc and silver.
Initially he experimented with individual cells in series, each cell being a wine goblet
filled with brine into which the two dissimilar electrodes were dipped.
The voltaic pile replaced the goblets with cardboard soaked in brine.
First battery In announcing his discovery of his voltaic
pile, Volta paid tribute to the influences of William Nicholson, Tiberius Cavallo, and
Abraham Bennet.
The battery made by Volta is credited as the first electrochemical cell.
It consists of two electrodes: one made of zinc, the other of copper.
The electrolyte is either sulfuric acid mixed with water or a form of saltwater brine.
The electrolyte exists in the form 2H+ and SO42−.
The zinc, which is higher than both copper and hydrogen in the electrochemical series,
reacts with the negatively charged sulfate.
The positively charged hydrogen ions capture electrons from the copper, forming bubbles
of hydrogen gas, H2.
This makes the zinc rod the negative electrode and the copper rod the positive electrode.
Thus, there are two terminals, and an electric current will flow if they are connected.
The chemical reactions in this voltaic cell are as follows:
zinc Zn → Zn2+ + 2e−
sulfuric acid 2H+ + 2e− → H2
The copper does not react, but rather it functions as an electrode for the electric current.
However, this cell also has some disadvantages.
It is unsafe to handle, since sulfuric acid, even if diluted, can be hazardous.
Also, the power of the cell diminishes over time because the hydrogen gas is not released.
Instead, it accumulates on the surface of the zinc electrode and forms a barrier between
the metal and the electrolyte solution.
Last years and retirement
In honor of his work, Volta was made a count by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1801.
Furthermore, his image was depicted upon the Italian 10,000 lira note along with a sketch
of his well-known voltaic pile.
Volta retired in 1819 to his estate in Camnago, a frazione of Como, Italy, now named "Camnago
Volta" in his honor.
He died there on March 5, 1827.
Volta's remains were also buried in Camnago Volta.
Volta's legacy is celebrated by the Tempio Voltiano memorial located in the public gardens
by the lake.
There is also a museum which has been built in his honor, and it exhibits some of the
original equipment that Volta used to conduct experiments.
Not far away stands the Villa Olmo, which houses the Voltian Foundation, an organization
promoting scientific activities.
Volta carried out his experimental studies and produced his first inventions near Como.
Religious beliefs Volta was raised as a Catholic and for all
of his life continued to maintain his belief.
Because he was not ordained a clergyman, like his family expected, he was sometimes accused
of being irreligious and some people have speculated about his possible unbelief, stressing
that "he did not join the Church", or that he virtually "ignored the church's call".
Nevertheless, he cast out doubts with a declaration of faith in which he said:
I do not understand how anyone can doubt the sincerity and constancy of my attachment to
the religion which I profess, the Roman, Catholic and Apostolic religion in which I was born
and brought up, and of which I have always made confession, externally and internally...
I have, indeed, and only too often, failed in the performance of those good works which
are the mark of a Catholic Christian, and I have been guilty of many sins: but through
the special mercy of God I have never, as far as I know, wavered in my faith.
In this faith I recognise a pure gift of God, a supernatural grace ; but I have not neglected
those human means which confirm belief, and overthrow the doubts which at times arise.
I studied attentively the grounds and basis of religion, the works of apologists and assailants,
the reasons for and against, and I can say that the result of such study is to clothe
religion with such a degree of probability, even for the merely natural reason, that every
spirit unperverted by sin and passion, every naturally noble spirit must love and accept
it.
May this confession which has been asked from me and which I willingly give, written and
subscribed by my own hand, with authority to show it to whomsoever you will, for I am
not ashamed of the Gospel, may it produce some good fruit.
Publications De vi attractiva ignis electrici
See also Volta Prize
Luigi Galvani Eudiometer
History of the battery Volta
History of the internal combustion engine Lemon battery
References
External links "Alessandro Volta".
Catholic Encyclopedia.
New York: Robert Appleton Company.
1913.
Volta and the "Pile" Alessandro Volta
Count Alessandro Giuseppe Antonio Anastasio Volta: A Pioneer in Electrochemistry
Count Alessandro Volta Alessandro Volta
Chisholm, Hugh, ed..
"Volta, Alessandro".
Encyclopædia Britannica.
Cambridge University Press.