词条 | Hooke, Robert |
释义 | Hooke, Robert British scientist born July 18, 1635, Freshwater, Isle of Wight, Eng. died March 3, 1703, London English physicist who discovered the law of elasticity, known as Hooke's law, and who did research in a remarkable variety of fields. In 1655 Hooke was employed by Robert Boyle (Boyle, Robert) to construct the Boylean air pump. Five years later, Hooke discovered his law of elasticity, which states that the stretching of a solid body (e.g., metal, wood) is proportional to the force applied to it. The law laid the basis for studies of stress and strain and for understanding of elastic materials. He applied these studies in his designs for the balance springs of watches. In 1662 he was appointed curator of experiments to the Royal Society of London and was elected a fellow the following year. ![]() He suggested that the force of gravity could be measured by utilizing the motion of a pendulum (1666) and attempted to show that the Earth and Moon follow an elliptical path around the Sun. In 1672 he discovered the phenomenon of diffraction (the bending of light rays around corners); to explain it, he offered the wave theory of light. He stated the inverse square law to describe planetary motions in 1678, a law that Newton (Newton, Sir Isaac) later used in modified form. Hooke complained that he was not given sufficient credit for the law and became involved in bitter controversy with Newton. Hooke was the first man to state in general that all matter expands when heated and that air is made up of particles separated from each other by relatively large distances. |
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