ALESSANDRO VOLTA

Early Life and Education

Alessandro Volta was born in Como, Lombardy, Italy, on February 18, 1745. His family was
part of the nobility, but not wealthy. Until the age of four, he showed no signs of talking, and
his family feared he was not very intelligent or possibly dumb. Fortunately, their fears were
misplaced.
When he was seven, his father died leaving unpaid debts.
The young Alessandro Volta was educated at home by his
uncle until he was twelve years old. He then started studies
at a Jesuit boarding school. The Jesuit school charged no
fees, but pressurized him to become a priest. His family did
not want this, and withdrew him from the school after four
years. Volta then studied at the Benzi Seminary until
reaching eighteen years of age.
Voltas family wanted him to become a lawyer. Volta had
his own ideas! He was interested in the world around him;
he wanted to be a scientist.
Although as a child he had been slow to speak Italian, Volta now seemed to have a special
talent for languages. Before he left school, he had learned Latin, French, English and
German. His language talents helped him in later life, when he traveled around Europe,
discussing his work with scientists in Europes centers of science.
Aged 18, Volta was bold enough to begin an exchange of letters about electricity with two
leading physicists: Jean-Antoine Nollet in Paris, and Giambatista Beccaria in Turin. Beccaria
did not like some of Voltas ideas and encouraged him to learn more by doing his experiments
for himself.
When he wrote his first dissertation, Volta addressed it and dedicated it to Beccaria.
Amateur Scientist, Inventor, Teacher and Physics Professor
1765 Volta had reached 20 years of age. His wealthy friend Giulio Cesare Gattoni had built
a physics laboratory in his home. For several years he kindly allowed Volta to do experiments
in this laboratory.
1765 Volta wrote his first scientific paper to Beccaria about static electricity generated by
rubbing different substances together i.e. triboelectricity.
1769 Volta published a dissertation titled On the Attractive Force of the Electric Fire, and
on the Phenomena Dependent On It, which he sent to Beccaria. He discussed his ideas on the
causes of electrical attraction and repulsion and compared these with gravity. He set out his
position that, like gravity, static electricity involved action at a distance. The main scientists
influencing his thinking were Isaac Newton, Roger Boscovich, Benjamin Franklin and
Giambatista Beccaria himself.
1771 Volta read Joseph Priestleys 1767 review of scientific research in electricity. He
learned that some discoveries he had recently made had already been made by others.

1774 Volta began work overseeing schools in Como. He said that teaching in Comos
classrooms should be modernized. He wanted the children to spend more time learning
science and modern languages.
1775 Volta began teaching experimental physics in Comos public grammar school, where
he worked until 1778.
1775 Volta wrote a letter to Joseph Priestley. He explained how he had invented a device
which was a source of static electricity: the electricity could be transferred to other objects.
We call this device the electrophorus. Volta wanted to know if the device was a new
invention. Priestly told him Johann Wilcke had invented such a device in 1762, but Volta had
invented it independently. Priestley encouraged Volta to keep up his interesting research
work.
1776 Aged 31, Volta was the first person to isolate methane gas. He discovered that a
methane-air mixture could be exploded in a closed container with an electric spark. In the
future, an electrically started chemical reaction like this would be the basis of the internal
combustion engine.
1776 Volta suggested that the sparking apparatus he used to explode methane could also be
used to send an electric signal along a wire from Como to the city of Milan.
1777 Volta invented a much better eudiometer than any that had gone before. A eudiometer
tests how much oxygen is present in air to determine how good for breathing it is. Voltas
eudiometer was superior to others because it used hydrogen as the gas reacting with oxygen,
giving a clean, reliable reaction. The reaction was also cleanly started using an electric spark.
The eudiometer worked on the basis that the decrease in volume of hydrogen after sparking
was proportional to the amount of oxygen present in air.
1777 Volta set out on a scientific journey to Switzerland and France. He met other scientists
and showed them his innovations in electrical equipment. He also wanted to travel so that his
name would become better known outside Italy.
1778 Volta was appointed to the Chair of Experimental Physics at the University of Pavia,
about 55 miles (85 km) from Como, a position he would hold for over 40 years.
1778 Volta discovered that the electrical potential (we now often call this the voltage) in a
capacitor is directly proportional to electrical charge.
1781 to 1782 Volta traveled around most of Europes major scientific centers, including the
French Academy in Paris, demonstrating his electrical equipment and inventions to eminent
people such as Antoine Lavoisier and Benjamin Franklin. Volta was beginning to become
well-known outside Italy.
1782 Volta wrote about the condenser he had constructed (today we would call it a
capacitor) to collect and store electric charge, and how he had used it to study a variety of
electrical phenomena.
1788 Volta built increasingly sensitive electroscopes to detect and measure the effects of
electric charge.

1790 Volta carried out experiments on the behavior of gases. He found an accurate value for
airs increasing volume with rising temperature.
1791 Recognizing that he had become one of Europes foremost electrical scientists, Volta
was elected to be a Fellow of the Royal Society of London.
1794 At the age of 50, Volta was awarded the Royal Societys top prize the Copley Medal
for his contributions to scientific understanding of electricity