August Toepler
| August Toepler | |
|---|---|
| Born |
August Joseph Ignaz Toepler 7 September 1836 Brühl bei Bonn, Germany |
| Died | 6 March 1912 (aged 75) Dresden, Saxony, Germany |
| Occupation | Physicist |
August Joseph Ignaz Toepler (7 September 1836 – 6 March 1912) was a German physicist known for his experiments in electrostatics.
August Toepler was born on 7 September 1836. He studied chemistry at the Gewerbe-Institut Berlin (1855–1858) and graduated from the University of Jena in 1860. Later Toepler turned to experimental physics. August Toepler was a lecturer of chemistry and physics at the Academy Poppelsdorf (1859-1864). He received a chair of chemistry and chemical technology at the Polytechnic Institute of Riga and he hold this position between 1864 and 1868.
In 1864, he applied Foucault's knife-edge test for telescope mirrors to the analysis of fluid flow and the shock wave. He named this new method schlieren photography, for which he is justifiably famous. He also developed the Toepler machine, an electrostatic influence machine, in 1865 for use in X-ray photography. Improved versions were produced by Wilhelm Holtz, Roger and J. Robert Voss.
In 1868, he became a professor at the University of Graz in Austria, where under his administration a new physical institute has appeared. In 1876, Toepler came to Dresden where he was offered the chair of Experimental Physics. He was a director of the Physical Institute at the Dresden Technical University till his retirement in 1900. His son Maximilian Toepler continued the scientific work independently. Toepler is remembered as an inventor of electrostatic machines, and for his work with air pumps and acoustic waves.
Toepler described also a symmetrical machine (1866) that is a sectorless machine and a similar device is used as a voltage multiplier.
Toepler’s electrostatic machines were made by different people and companies, e.g. a Toepler machine can be found in a Welch Scientific Company (Chicago, USA) catalog. The differences between a Toepler machine, a Holtz machine, and a Toepler-Holtz machine are unclear even in books written when they were vital, modern technology. Sometimes such a machine is called a Holtz-Toepler machine simply because it was made by Holtz, but the original design is still the same as the Toepler machine.
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