Henry Moseley

Henry Gwyn Jeffreys Moseley ( born November 23, 1887 in Weymouth, † 10 August 1915 Gallipoli) was a British physicist. His most important scientific contribution was the proof of the correctness of the concept of atomic number in chemistry.

Life and work

1906 Henry Moseley joined the Trinity College, Oxford University. After graduation, he worked at the University of Manchester with Ernest Rutherford. In his early years he was there mainly deals with the doctrine, after a few years he was relieved of teaching responsibilities and began to devote himself entirely to research.

In 1913, he was with the help of X-ray spectroscopy a systematic relationship between the wavelength and the atomic number ( Moseley's law ). Previously it had been assumed that the atomic number is an arbitrary number based on the order of the atomic weights, but needs to be changed ( for example, by Dmitri Mendeleev) to bring an item to the right place in the periodic table. Moseley's discovery showed that atomic numbers had an experimentally measurable basis. In addition, he showed that there were gaps in the numbers 43, 61 and 75 (now known as the radioactive elements technetium and promethium and the stable but rare rhenium ). Therefore, he said, in the tradition of Mendeleev advance these three elements. His work was further evidence of the then controversial theory of the atom.

1914 he left Manchester to return to Oxford and continue his research. But after the First World War broke out, he enlisted in the Royal Engineers. He fell in the battle of Gallipoli in the Dardanelles on the Gallipoli Peninsula.

According to him, the moon crater Moseley is named.