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FIRST EDITION. Frontisportrait. Contemporary prize binding. Very Good. Prize bookplate on front pastedown, inscribed in April, 1857, to James J. Wilson by James D. Forbes. 'Still the definitive source on Young's life, since it uses material such as his journal which have since disappeared' (Home no. 83). Forbes (1809- 1868) 'was a Scottish physicist who worked extensively on the conduction of heat, seismology and glaciology. Forbes was a resident of Edinburgh for most of his life, educated at the University and a professor there from 1833 until he became principal of the United College of St. Andrews in 1859. . . . At the age of nineteen he became a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and in 1832 he was elected to the Royal Society of London. A year later he was appointed professor of natural philosophy in Edinburgh University, in succession to Sir John Leslie and in competition with Sir David Brewster, and during his tenure of that office, which he did not give up till 1860, he not only proved himself an active and efficient teacher, but also did much to improve the internal conditions of the university. In 1859 he was appointed successor to Brewster in the principalship of the United College of St. Andrews, a position which he held until his death at Clifton in 1868. As a scientific investigator he is best known for his researches on heat and on glaciers. Between 1836 and 1844 he published in the Trans. Roy. Soc. Ed. four series of 'Researches on Heat,' in the course of which he demonstrated that tourmaline would polarize infrared thermal radiation, by transmission through a bundle of thin mica plates inclined to the transmitted ray, and by reflection from the multiplied surfaces of a pile of mica plates placed at the polarizing angle, and also its circular polarization by two internal reflections in rhombs of rock salt. His work won him the Rumford Medal of the Royal Society in 1838, and in 1843 he received its Royal Medal for a paper on the 'Transparency of the Atmosphere and the Laws of Extinction of the Sun's Rays passing through it' ' (Wikipedia). Seller Inventory # 20962
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Bibliographic Details
Title: Life of Thomas Young, M.D. (Prize bookplate ...
Publisher: London: John Murray, 1855.
Publication Date: 1855
Binding: Hardcover
Condition: Near Fine
Dust Jacket Condition: No Jacket
Signed: Signed by Author(s)
