František Koláček (9 October 1851,

Slavkov u Brna Slavkov u Brna (; historically known in German as Austerlitz) is a town in Vyškov District in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 7,000 inhabitants. The town gave its name to the Battle of Austerlitz which took place seve ...

Moravia Moravia ( , also , ; cs, Morava ; german: link=yes, Mähren ; pl, Morawy ; szl, Morawa; la, Moravia) is a historical region in the east of the Czech Republic and one of three historical Czech lands, with Bohemia and Czech Silesia. The m ...

– 8 December 1913,

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and List of cities in the Czech Republic, largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 milli ...

) was a

Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus' Places * Czech, ...

physicist. Koláček studied at the German gymnasium in Brno (finished in 1868), then at the technical universities in Prague and

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

. At the

Charles University in Prague ) , image_name = Carolinum_Logo.svg , image_size = 200px , established = , type = Public, Ancient , budget = 8.9 billion CZK , rector = Milena Králíčková , faculty = 4,057 , administrative_staff = 4,026 , students = 51,438 , undergr ...

, under guidance of Ernst Mach, he obtained the doctoral decree in 1877. He worked as a teacher at the gymnasium in Brno (1 year) and then in Prague (18 years). Only in 1891 was he named professor of mathematical physics at Charles university. During 1900 - 1902 he worked as a professor at the university in Brno but then returned to Prague. Koláček worked in the fields of hydrodynamics, thermodynamics, optics and electromagnetic theory of light. He was the first one to describe the electromagnetic theory of light dispersion.

References

* Příruční slovník naučný 1962 (encyclopedia by

Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences The Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences (Czech: ''Československá akademie věd'', Slovak: ''Česko-slovenská akadémia vied'') was established in 1953 to be the scientific center for Czechoslovakia. It was succeeded by the Czech Academy of Science ...

): volume II, page 529.

External links

Short biography, other references (in Czech)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kolacek, Frantisek 1851 births 1913 deaths 19th-century Czech scientists 19th-century physicists Czech physicists Charles University alumni People from Slavkov u Brna