Olinto De Pretto

Olinto De Pretto
Olinto De Pretto
Born	(1857-04-26)26 April 1857 Schio, Province of Vicenza, Italy
Died	16 March 1921(1921-03-16) (aged 63) Schio, Province of Vicenza, Italy
Residence	Schio, Italy
Nationality	Italian
Fields	Theoretical physics Geology
Institutions	Superior School of Agriculture, Milano mechanical foundry mill Alpinistic Circle
Alma mater	Superior School of Agriculture, Milano
Academic advisors	Gaetano Cantoni
Known for	Nonrelativistic derivation of the mass–energy equivalence relation (E=mc2) Work on the radioactive decay of uranium and thorium Effects of glaciers on the formation of mountains Work on agronomics

Olinto De Pretto (26 April 1857 – 16 March 1921) was an Italian industrialist and geologist from Schio, Vicenza. There are claims that De Pretto may have been the first person to derive the energy–mass-equivalence ${\displaystyle E=mc^{2}}$, generally attributed to Albert Einstein. He suggested that radioactive decay of uranium and thorium was an example of mass transforming into energy.

Olinto De Pretto was born on April 26, 1857 in Schio in what is now the province of Vicenza in northern Italy. Olinto was the sixth of seven children (three boys, four girls). His mother was Angelica Boschetti (1822–1905). His father, Pietro De Pretto (1810–1891), was an architect whose hobbies included astronomy and geology, two studies Olinto would later take up.

He attended the Superior School of Agriculture in Milano where he studied agriculture and geology with a major in agronomics. He graduated in 1879 with a degree in agronomics. Immediately upon graduation he became a university assistant to professor , a Dean of the agricultural school. Together they developed methods that helped modernize Italian agriculture by improving methods of crop rotation and analyzing soil chemistry.