Arthur Wehnelt

Arthur Rudolph Berthold Whenelt ( born April 4, 1871 in Rio de Janeiro, † February 15, 1944 in Berlin) was a German physicist who made ​​important contributions to electrodynamics.

Life

His grandfather was the Fürstenwalder draper champion Samuel Whenelt. His father, Ferdinand Adolph Berthold Whenelt ( born February 4, 1833 † July 2, 1872 in Hamburg) was a naval architect and co-founder and co-owner of the Brazilian Lloyd. On May 23, 1867 he married in Fiirstenwalde Marie Louise Charlotte, the daughter of shoemaker Johann Friedrich Muckelberg, with whom he had two children. After an illness he died on the way home from Brazil. In March 2008, his tomb in prince Walde was rediscovered.

After Arthur Whenelt remained seated on Luisenstädtischer Gymnasium in Berlin in the Tertia twice, he was sent to the grammar school in Landsberg on the Warta River, where in 1892 he was the matriculation examination. His military service he rendered in Brandenburg.

He studied physics at the Technical University of Charlottenburg and from 1893 to 1897 at the Friedrich- Wilhelms- University of Berlin. He received his Ph.D. in 1898 in Erlangen, where Eilhard Wiedemann was his teacher. After his habilitation in 1901, he taught as a lecturer and from 1904 as associate professor of physics at the Friedrich- Alexander -University Erlangen -Nuremberg. 1906 moved Whenelt professor at the University of Berlin back in 1934 he was appointed director of the Physics Institute, professor emeritus in 1937. He spent his final years in Berlin- Frohnau.

Work

1899 Invented Wehnelt the Wehnelt interrupter electrolyte based, which allows the rapid rhythmic interruption of a direct current.

His developments in the field of electron emission, the Wehnelt cylinder (1902 /03) and the oxide cathode / Wehnelt cathode ( 1905) improved the invented by Ferdinand Braun CRT, inter alia later for televisions and computer monitors has become essential.

1926 succeeded Whenelt first scheduling the experimental proof of the space charge in electron tubes.

Others

In the Berlin district of Siemens City is named after him since September 9, 1931, the road Wehneltsteig.

Writings (selection )

• Arthur Whenelt: studies on the dark cathode space, Thesis, Erlangen, 1898
• Arthur Whenelt: current and voltage measurements on cathodes in discharge tubes, Habilitation Thesis, Erlangen, 1901
• Arthur Whenelt: About the escape of negative ions from glowing metal compounds and related phenomena. In: Ann. Physics 319, 1904, pp. 425-468
• Arthur Whenelt: On the heat conductivity of metals, Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft, Leipzig 1927 ( = Ostwald 's classic of Exact Sciences, No. 222)
• Arthur Whenelt, Sergius Seiliger: About emission of electrons and positive ions in the melting point of metals. In: Journal of Physics A 38, 1926, pp. 443-464