AUC HISTORIA UNIVERSITATIS CAROLINAE PRAGENSIS
AUC HISTORIA UNIVERSITATIS CAROLINAE PRAGENSIS

The journal AUC Historia Universitatis Carolinae Pragensis, subtitled “Příspěvky k dějinám Univerzity Karlovy” (Papers on the History of Charles University), is a periodical devoted not only to the history of the Prague university but also to the history of education and student movement in the Czech lands. The journal, published since 1960 as part of the Acta Universitatis Carolinae series, also publishes essays presenting original historical sources (all texts are accompanied by summaries in foreign languages, mainly in English and German). It regularly publishes reviews and annotations of works on the history of education and annals of research activities.

The journal is archived in Portico.

AUC HISTORIA UNIVERSITATIS CAROLINAE PRAGENSIS, Vol 62 No 2 (2022), 127–183

Asistent Fyzikálního ústavu Německé univerzity v Praze v letech 1906–1914 se „slibným“ jménem Weiss a měření elementárního elektrického náboje

[Assistant at the Institute of Physics of the German University in Prague in 1906–1914 with ‘Promising’ Name Weiss and His Measurements of the Elementary Electric Charge]

Emilie Těšínská

DOI: https://doi.org/10.14712/23365730.2023.3
published online: 13. 06. 2023

abstract

This study is dedicated to the Austrian physicist Edmund Weiss (1884–1932) and his time as assistant at the Institute of Physics of the German University in Prague in 1906–1914. Particular attention is paid to his 1911 habilitation work on the elementary quantum of electricity, which he measured in experiments with ultramicroscopic silver particles. In this work, Weiss repeated the measurements of Vienna physicist Felix Ehrenhaft. Unlike he, Weiss managed to confirm – with the help of Einstein’s 1905 formula for Brownian molecular motion – the value of elementary quantum of electricity, which had first been established by R. A. Millikan in his ‘oil drop’ experiments. Albert Einstein, at that time (in 1911–1912) professor of theoretical physics at the German University in Prague, praised Edmund Weiss and his work at the First Solvay Conference on Physics in Brussels in autumn 1911. Details of Weiss’s habilitation work at the Institute of Physics in Prague were described in letters written by Anton Lampa, professor and director of the institute, and addressed to the doyen of Viennese physics Viktor von Lang. Full texts of six of Lampa’s letters (in German) are appended to the study.

keywords: Edmund Weiss (1884–1932); Albert Einstein; German University in Prague; elementary quantum of electricity

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Asistent Fyzikálního ústavu Německé univerzity v Praze v letech 1906–1914 se „slibným“ jménem Weiss a měření elementárního elektrického náboje is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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