Francesco Rossetti (
Trento
Trento ( or ; Ladin language, Ladin and ; ; ; ; ; ), also known in English as Trent, is a city on the Adige, Adige River in Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol in Italy. It is the capital of the Trentino, autonomous province of Trento. In the 16th ...
, 14 September 1833 –
Padova
Padua ( ) is a city and ''comune'' (municipality) in Veneto, northern Italy, and the capital of the province of Padua. The city lies on the banks of the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice and southeast of Vicenza, and has a population of ...
, 20 April 1885) was an Italian experimental physicist.
Biography
Son of Giovanni Battista, Rossetti started his education in his natal town Trento. He then attended the
University of Padova
The University of Padua (, UNIPD) is an Italian public research university in Padua, Italy. It was founded in 1222 by a group of students and teachers from the University of Bologna, who previously settled in Vicenza; thus, it is the second-oldest ...
and, from 1854 to 1857, the
University of Vienna
The University of Vienna (, ) is a public university, public research university in Vienna, Austria. Founded by Rudolf IV, Duke of Austria, Duke Rudolph IV in 1365, it is the oldest university in the German-speaking world and among the largest ...
, where he heard classes in mathematics, chemistry and physics, and graduated in physics and mathematics. His advisor was
Andreas von Ettingshausen.
Among his fellow students there were
Josef Stefan
Josef Stefan (; 24 March 1835 – 7 January 1893) was a Carinthian Slovene physicist, mathematician, and poet of the Austrian Empire.
Life and work
Stefan was born in the village of St. Peter (Slovene: ) on the outskirts of Klagenfurt) to A ...
(future supervisor of
Ludwig Boltzmann
Ludwig Eduard Boltzmann ( ; ; 20 February 1844 – 5 September 1906) was an Austrian mathematician and Theoretical physics, theoretical physicist. His greatest achievements were the development of statistical mechanics and the statistical ex ...
) and
Ernst Mach
Ernst Waldfried Josef Wenzel Mach ( ; ; 18 February 1838 – 19 February 1916) was an Austrian physicist and philosopher, who contributed to the understanding of the physics of shock waves. The ratio of the speed of a flow or object to that of ...
.
In 1857 he became a teacher at the Liceo di Santa Caterina in
Venice
Venice ( ; ; , formerly ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 islands that are separated by expanses of open water and by canals; portions of the city are li ...
. In 1860 he was hired by the University of Padova. Having obtained a year's leave by the Austrian government, he spent 1864 in
Paris
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
working in the laboratory of the physicist and chemist
Henri-Victor Regnault
Henri Victor Regnault (21 July 1810 – 19 January 1878) was a French chemist and physicist best known for his careful measurements of the thermal properties of gases. He was an early thermodynamicist and was mentor to William Thomson in ...
. In 1866 he became extraordinary professor and in 1880 full professor of experimental physics at the University of Padova. He was the dean of the faculty of science from 1876 to 1885. He has been member of the
National Academy of Sciences
The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...
since 1879, of the
National Lincei Academy since 1882, and of other important Italian and international scientific academies and societies.
His scientific activity mainly concerned
electrostatics
Electrostatics is a branch of physics that studies slow-moving or stationary electric charges.
Since classical antiquity, classical times, it has been known that some materials, such as amber, attract lightweight particles after triboelectric e ...
,
electrochemistry
Electrochemistry is the branch of physical chemistry concerned with the relationship between Electric potential, electrical potential difference and identifiable chemical change. These reactions involve Electron, electrons moving via an electronic ...
, and thermometry of flames. He published 42 papers. In 1862 he was the doctoral advisor of
Andrea Naccari.
Main works by Rossetti
* ''Sull'uso delle coppie termoelettriche nella misura delle temperature'' 1867.
* ''Sul maximum di densità e sulla dilatazione dell'acqua distillata, dell'acqua dell'Adriatico e di alcune soluzioni saline'' 1868.
* ''Sul magnetismo'' 1871.
* ''Uso della macchina di Holtz in alcune ricerche elettrometriche sui condensatori elettrici'' 1872.
* ''Sul potere specifico induttivo dei coibenti'' 1873.
* ''Nuovi studii sulle correnti delle macchine elettriche'' 1874.
* 1874.
* ''Indagini sperimentali sulla temperatura del sole'' 1878.
* ''Sul potere assorbente, sul potere emissivo termico delle fiamme e sulla temperatura dell'arco voltaico'' 1878.
References
* ''Francesco Rossetti'' in Enciclopedia Biografica Universale Treccani, XVI, p. 614, Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, Roma, 2007.
* ''Rossetti, Francesco (1833-1885), Physiker'' i
Österreichisches Biografisches Lexikon 1815-1950, Bd. 9 (Lfg. 43, 1986), S. 263* Obituary of Francesco Rossetti, made by the secretary Blaserna of the Reale Accademia dei Lincei
Atti della Reale Accademia dei Lincei, anno CCLXXXII, 1884-85, serie quarta, Rendiconti pag. 337.
External links
* Francesco Rossetti,
Bibliografia italiana di elettricità e magnetismo', F. Sacchetto (1881).
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rossetti, Francesco
Scientists from the Austrian Empire
19th-century Italian physicists
1833 births
1885 deaths