James Clerk MAXWELL (Maxwell James Clerk)

(1831-1879)
Born June 13, 1831 in Edinburgh, the Scottish nobleman in the family of a noble family Clerks. He studied first at Edinburgh (1847-1850), then at Cambridge (1850-1854) Universities. In 1855 became a member of the Board of Trinity College, in 1856-1860 was a professor Marishal College, University of Aberdeen, since 1860 headed the department of physics and astronomy at King's College, University of London. In 1865, in connection with a serious illness Maxwell refused to chair and settled down in his family estate near Edinburgh Glenler. He continued to study science, has written several works on physics and mathematics. In 1871 at Cambridge University, took the chair of Experimental Physics. He organized a research laboratory, which opened on June 16, 1874 and was named Cavendish - in honor of H. Cavendish.
His first scientific work Maxwell performed back in school by inventing a simple way of tracing the oval shapes. This work was reported at the meeting of the Royal Society and even published in his 'Proceedings'. When he was a member of the Board of Trinity College was engaged in experiments on color theory, speaking as the successor of Jung's theory and the theory of three primary colors of Helmholtz. In experiments on mixing colors Maxwell used a special spinner, the disc which was divided into sectors, painted in different colors (disk Maxwell). With the rapid rotation of the top colors merged: if the disk has been colored so, . as there are colors of the spectrum, . He looked white, and if one half of his paints red, . and another - yellow, . he seemed to orange, mixing blue and yellow gave the impression of green,
. In 1860, for work on the perception of color and optics, Maxwell was awarded the Rumford medal.

In 1857 the University of Cambridge has announced a competition for the best work on the stability of Saturn's rings. These structures were discovered by Galileo in the early 17. and presents an amazing mystery of nature: the planet seemed to be surrounded by three concentric rings solid, consisting of a substance of unknown nature. Laplace proved that they can not be firm. After mathematical analysis, Maxwell was convinced that they can not be liquid, and concluded that such a structure can be sustained only in the event that consists of a swarm of unconnected meteorites. Stability of the rings is provided by their attraction to Saturn and reciprocal movement of planets and meteorites. For this work, Maxwell won Dzh.Adamsa.

One of the first Maxwell began his kinetic theory of gases. In 1859 the scientist spoke at a meeting of the British Association of the report, which resulted in the distribution of molecular velocity (Maxwell distribution). Maxwell developed the idea of his predecessor in the development of the kinetic theory of gases R. Clausius, who introduced the concept of 'mean free path'. Maxwell proceeded from the idea of a gas as an ensemble set of perfectly elastic balls, randomly moving in a confined space. Balls (molecules) can be divided into groups according to the velocities, while in the steady state number of molecules in each group remains constant, though they may leave the group and to join them. From this review, it followed that 'the particle distribution in velocity by the same law, on any distributed errors of observation in the theory of least squares method, ie. in accordance with the statistics of Gauss'. As part of his theory of Maxwell explained Avogadro's law, diffusion, thermal conductivity, internal friction (transport theory). In 1867, he showed statistical nature of the second law of thermodynamics ( 'Maxwell demon').

In 1831, the year of birth of Maxwell, Michael Faraday conducted classic experiments that led to his discovery of electromagnetic induction. Maxwell began to study electricity and magnetism about 20 years later, when there were two views on the nature of electric and magnetic effects. Scholars like A. Ampere and F. Neumann, adhered to the concept of long-range, considering the electromagnetic force as an analogue of the gravitational attraction between two masses. Faraday was a supporter of the idea of power lines that connect the positive and negative electrical charges, or north and south poles of a magnet. Power lines fill the surrounding space (field, Faraday's terminology) and determine the electric and magnetic interactions. Following Faraday, Maxwell developed a hydrodynamic model of power lines and expressed the then-known relation of electrodynamics in mathematical language, the corresponding mechanical model of Faraday. The main results of this study are reflected in the work of Faraday lines of force (Faraday's Lines of Force, 1857). In 1860-1865 Maxwell created the theory of electromagnetic field, . which is formulated as a system of equations (Maxwell equations), . describing the basic laws of electromagnetic phenomena: 1-th equation is an expression of Faraday's electromagnetic induction, 2-e - magnetoelectric induction, . open Maxwell and based on perceptions of bias currents; 3rd - the law of conservation of electricity, 4-e - the vortex nature of the magnetic field,
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While continuing to develop these ideas, Maxwell came to the conclusion that any change in the electric and magnetic fields to induce changes in the power lines that penetrate the surrounding space, ie. there should be pulses (or wave), propagating in the medium. Velocity of propagation of these waves (electromagnetic disturbance) depends on the dielectric and magnetic permeability of the medium and is the ratio of electromagnetic to electrostatic units. According to Maxwell and other researchers, this ratio is 3CH1010 cm / s, which is close to the speed of light, measured seven years earlier by the French physicist A. Fizeau. In October 1861 Maxwell Faraday said of his discovery: the light - is electromagnetic perturbations propagating in a non-conducting medium, ie. kind of electromagnetic waves. This final stage of the research described in the Dynamic Theory of the Maxwell electromagnetic field (Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism, 1864), but a result of his work on electrodynamics led the famous Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism (1873).

The last years of his life Maxwell was preparing to print and publishing the manuscript heritage of the Cavendish. Two large volumes came out in October 1879. Maxwell died in Cambridge on Nov. 5, 1879.