Thomas Jung: Contribution to Physics

The article tells about who Thomas Young is, how he contributed to the development of physics and what else he did besides it.

The science

At all times there were curious people who were interested in knowing the true structure of the universe, some of its individual processes or phenomena. In our time, the importance of science for mankind is not in doubt, but it was not always so. Fortunately, those times have long since passed, and the last few hundred years have unceasingly been made by outstanding discoveries from the field of physics and other sciences. And Thomas Young is one of those who are put on a par with other great scientists of past years - Becquerel, Lomonosov, Mendeleev.

But what is he famous for and what discoveries did he make? We will talk about this in this article. This scientist is also known for being not limited to his research in physics alone. On his account, scientific work on optics, mechanics, philology and physiology of vision.

Contribution of Thomas Young to the development of physics

In 1793, Jung, in one of his works on human sight, pointed out that the accommodation of the eye is due to the process of changing the curvature of the lens. Further observations in the field of optics led the scientist to the idea that the corpuscular theory of light, which at that time was considered predominant, was not entirely correct. When Jung spoke in favor of the wave theory of light, almost all the scientists of England at that time disagreed with him, and under the pressure of their opinion he for the time refused his own conclusions. However, later Thomas Young returned to his wave theory of light and was the first to consider the problem of superposition of waves. Investigating this phenomenon further, he discovered the principle of interference. True, this term was introduced by Jung himself only a few years later.

And in one of the reports to the Royal Society, he also first gave an explanation to the so-called Newton rings, based on this on the basis of interference, and talked about his first experiments, the purpose of which was to measure the lengths of different light waves. So now we know what Thomas Young is famous for.

In 1804, he detailed and described the phenomenon of diffraction. After research by the scientist Fresnel on the interference of light, which is polarized, Jung conjectured about the kopeckiness of light-wave oscillations. Including Jung's merits is the development of the theory of color vision, which is based on the assumption that the eye envelope contains photosensitive fibers that react to the three main light spectra. Now let us consider the most famous experience of Thomas Young.

An experience

This experiment became the proof of the wave theory of light. And his first results were published in 1803. In this experiment, a beam of light was directed to an opaque screen, on which were placed two parallel slots. A projection screen was installed behind the screen. The feature of parallel slots was that their width was approximately equal to the wavelength of the light emitted in the experiment. And as a result of this, a whole series of interference fringes appeared on the screen, which proved the correctness of the theory, which Thomas Young defended. The physicist visually demonstrated to the observers the wave nature of light.

Other scientific works

Engaged in this outstanding scholar of his time also linguistics - he proved the relationship of the Indo-European languages. And by the way, the definition of "Indo-European" was invented by him. Also among his merits is the introduction of such a characteristic as the numerical value of elasticity during compression or stretching, which was called the Young's modulus.

Thomas Jung: Biography

The future scientist was born in 1773 in the family of a simple silk merchant. Early he learned to read and already in his childhood he had a very good memory, curiosity and a strong desire for science. So, at the age of 8, he was seriously interested in mathematics and geodesy, where he showed remarkable talents. And as a teenager, he already knew languages such as Latin, Hebrew, Italian, Arabic and French. Not every adult can boast of so much linguistic knowledge! In addition to all this, according to memories of relatives, Jung was also fond of history and botany.

But initially Jung chose medicine as his life's occupation. He received his doctor's degree in 1796. But the event that made him financially independent and allowed him to go into science without thinking about the source of earnings was the death of his uncle - he left young Thomas with a large monetary inheritance.

Later, Jung opened a private medical practice and at the same time began to publish. But anonymously, because he feared for his reputation as a doctor. Later I got carried away with acoustics and optics. At the age of 21, he became an active member of the Royal Society of London and for a time held the post of secretary. In 1803 he received the title of professor of the Royal Institute. A year later he married Elise Maxwell.

Despite his progress in physics, from 1811 until the very end of his life, Thomas Jung continued to work as a doctor in a hospital in London. He did not part with the profession of a doctor and in 1818, when he became secretary of the Bureau of Longitudes and editor of such publications as the "Nautical Calendar". Jung also contributed, in addition to one of the editions of the British Encyclopedia, by writing about 60 chapters. Mostly these were biographies of scientists.

Conclusion

In addition to medicine and science, he is also known as a good musician, connoisseur of painting and gymnast. This versatile person passed away on May 10, 1829. Thomas Jung was buried in London.