Adolf Wüllner (13 June 1835, in

Düsseldorf Düsseldorf ( , , ; often in English sources; Low Franconian and Ripuarian: ''Düsseldörp'' ; archaic nl, Dusseldorp ) is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in ...

– 6 October 1908, in Aachen) was a German

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate ca ...

. He studied physics at the universities of

Bonn The federal city of Bonn ( lat, Bonna) is a city on the banks of the Rhine in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, with a population of over 300,000. About south-southeast of Cologne, Bonn is in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ru ...

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

and

Berlin Berlin is Capital of Germany, the capital and largest city of Germany, both by area and List of cities in Germany by population, by population. Its more than 3.85 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European U ...

, qualifying as a lecturer at the

University of Marburg The Philipps University of Marburg (german: Philipps-Universität Marburg) was founded in 1527 by Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse, which makes it one of Germany's oldest universities and the oldest still operating Protestant university in the worl ...

in 1858. In 1862 he became director of the vocational school in Aachen, and three years later taught classes in physics at the Poppelsdorf agricultural academy. In 1867 he was named an associate professor at the University of Bonn, and from 1869 onward, was a professor of physics at the Technical University of Aachen. In 1883–86 he served as

academic rector A rector (Latin for 'ruler') is a senior official in an educational institution, and can refer to an official in either a university or a secondary school. Outside the English-speaking world the rector is often the most senior official in a un ...

.MKL1888:Wüllner
Meyers Konversations-Lexikon He is remembered for his work on the

specific heat In thermodynamics, the specific heat capacity (symbol ) of a substance is the heat capacity of a sample of the substance divided by the mass of the sample, also sometimes referred to as massic heat capacity. Informally, it is the amount of he ...

of liquids and gases, vapor tension, refractive indexes and emission spectra.

Published works

He was the author of a successful textbook on

experimental physics Experimental physics is the category of disciplines and sub-disciplines in the field of physics that are concerned with the observation of physical phenomena and experiments. Methods vary from discipline to discipline, from simple experiments and o ...

that was published over several editions: * ''Lehrbuch der Experimentalphysik'' (2 volumes 1862–65; 5th edition, 4 volumes 1907): ** Vol. 1: ''Allgemeine Physik und Akustik'' – General physics and acoustics. ** Vol. 2: ''Die Lehre von der Wärme'' – On heat. ** Vol. 3: ''Die Lehre vom Magnetismus und von der Elektricität'' – On magnetism and electricity. ** Vol, 4: ''Die Lehre von der Strahlung'' – On radiation. Other noted works of his include: * ''Ueber den Einfluss des Procentgehaltes auf die Spannkraft der Dämpfe aus wässerigen Salzlösungen'' (inaugural dissertation, 1856). * ''Die Absorption des Lichtes in isotropen Mitteln'', 1862 – Absorption of light in isotropic agents. * ''Einleitung in die Dioptrik des Auges'', 1866 – Introduction to the

dioptrics Dioptrics is the branch of optics dealing with refraction, similarly the branch dealing with mirrors is known as catoptrics. Dioptrics is the study of the refraction of light, especially by lenses. Telescopes that create their image with an obje ...

of the eye. * ''Die Entwicklung der Grundanschauungen in der Physik im Laufe unseres Jahrhunderts'', 1887 – The development of the fundamental principles in physics during the course of our century. He was also the author of many scientific papers in the journal ''

Annalen der Physik und Chemie ''Annalen der Physik'' (English: ''Annals of Physics'') is one of the oldest scientific journals on physics; it has been published since 1799. The journal publishes original, peer-reviewed papers on experimental, theoretical, applied, and mathe ...

''.Adolf Wüllner
de.Wikisource (bibliography)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wullner, Adolf 1835 births 1908 deaths Scientists from Düsseldorf University of Bonn faculty RWTH Aachen University faculty 19th-century German physicists University of Bonn alumni Scientists from North Rhine-Westphalia