Prof
Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professors ...
George Francis FitzGerald (3 August 1851 – 22 February 1901) was an Irish academic and physicist who served as
Erasmus Smith's Professor of Natural and Experimental Philosophy at Trinity College Dublin (TCD) from 1881 to 1901.
FitzGerald is known for his work in electromagnetic theory and for the
Lorentz–FitzGerald contraction
Length contraction is the phenomenon that a moving object's length is measured to be shorter than its proper length, which is the length as measured in the object's own rest frame. It is also known as Lorentz contraction or Lorentz–FitzGeral ...
, which became an integral part of
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...
's
special theory of relativity
In physics, the special theory of relativity, or special relativity for short, is a scientific theory regarding the relationship between space and time. In Albert Einstein's original treatment, the theory is based on two postulates:
# The laws o ...
. A
crater on the
far side of the Moon
The far side of the Moon is the lunar hemisphere that always faces away from Earth, opposite to the near side, because of synchronous rotation in the Moon's orbit. Compared to the near side, the far side's terrain is rugged, with a multitu ...
is named after him, as is a building at TCD.
Life and work in physics
FitzGerald was born at No. 19, Lower Mount Street in
Dublin
Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...
on 3 August 1851 to the Reverend
William FitzGerald and his wife Anne Frances Stoney (sister of
George Johnstone Stoney and
Bindon Blood Stoney
Bindon Blood Stoney FRS (13 June 1828, Oakley Park, County Offaly – 5 May 1909, Dublin) was an Irish engineer who also made some significant contributions to astronomy.
Family
A son of George Stoney (1792–) and Anne Blood (1801–1883), St ...
). Professor of Moral Philosophy in Trinity and vicar of St Anne's, Dawson Street, at the time of his son's birth, William FitzGerald was consecrated
Bishop of Cork, Cloyne and Ross
The Bishop of Cork, Cloyne and Ross is the Church of Ireland Ordinary of the united Diocese of Cork, Cloyne and Ross in the Province of Dublin.
The current bishop is the Right Reverend Paul Colton
William Paul Colton (born 13 March 1960) ...
in 1857 and
translated
Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''transla ...
to
Killaloe and Clonfert in 1862. George returned to Dublin and entered TCD as a student at the age of 16, winning a scholarship in 1870 and graduating in 1871 in Mathematics and Experimental Science. He became a Fellow of Trinity in 1877 and spent the rest of his career there, becoming
in 1881.
Along with
Oliver Lodge
Sir Oliver Joseph Lodge, (12 June 1851 – 22 August 1940) was a British physicist and writer involved in the development of, and holder of key patents for, radio. He identified electromagnetic radiation independent of Heinrich Rudolf Hertz, H ...
,
Oliver Heaviside
Oliver Heaviside FRS (; 18 May 1850 – 3 February 1925) was an English self-taught mathematician and physicist who invented a new technique for solving differential equations (equivalent to the Laplace transform), independently developed vec ...
and
Heinrich Hertz
Heinrich Rudolf Hertz ( ; ; 22 February 1857 – 1 January 1894) was a German physicist who first conclusively proved the existence of the electromagnetic waves predicted by James Clerk Maxwell's Maxwell's equations, equations of electrom ...
, FitzGerald was a leading figure among the group of "Maxwellians" who revised, extended, clarified, and confirmed
James Clerk Maxwell
James Clerk Maxwell (13 June 1831 – 5 November 1879) was a Scottish mathematician and scientist responsible for the classical theory of electromagnetic radiation, which was the first theory to describe electricity, magnetism and ligh ...
's mathematical theories of the
electromagnetic field
An electromagnetic field (also EM field or EMF) is a classical (i.e. non-quantum) field produced by (stationary or moving) electric charges. It is the field described by classical electrodynamics (a classical field theory) and is the classical c ...
during the late 1870s and the 1880s.
In 1883, following from
Maxwell's equations
Maxwell's equations, or Maxwell–Heaviside equations, are a set of coupled partial differential equations that, together with the Lorentz force law, form the foundation of classical electromagnetism, classical optics, and electric circuits.
...
, FitzGerald was the first to suggest a device for producing rapidly oscillating electric currents to generate
electromagnetic wave
In physics, electromagnetic radiation (EMR) consists of waves of the electromagnetic (EM) field, which propagate through space and carry momentum and electromagnetic radiant energy. It includes radio waves, microwaves, infrared, (visib ...
s, a phenomenon which was first shown to exist experimentally by the German physicist Heinrich Hertz in 1888.
In 1883, he was elected
Fellow of the Royal Society
Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the judges of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural science, natural knowledge, incl ...
.
In 1899, was awarded a
Royal Medal for his investigations in theoretical physics.
In 1900, he was made an honorary fellow of the
Royal Society of Edinburgh.
FitzGerald suffered from many digestive problems for much of his shortened life. He became very ill with stomach problems. He died at his home, 7 Ely Place in Dublin, shortly after an operation on a perforated ulcer on 21 February 1901. He is buried in
Mount Jerome cemetery
Mount is often used as part of the name of specific mountains, e.g. Mount Everest.
Mount or Mounts may also refer to:
Places
* Mount, Cornwall, a village in Warleggan parish, England
* Mount, Perranzabuloe, a hamlet in Perranzabuloe parish, C ...
.
Length contraction
FitzGerald is better known for his conjecture in his short letter to the editor of
Science
Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe.
Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence for ...
() that if all moving objects were foreshortened in the direction of their motion, it would account for the curious null-results of the
Michelson–Morley experiment
The Michelson–Morley experiment was an attempt to detect the existence of the luminiferous aether, a supposed medium permeating space that was thought to be the carrier of light waves. The experiment was performed between April and July 1887 ...
. FitzGerald based this idea in part on the way
electromagnetic force
In physics, electromagnetism is an interaction that occurs between particles with electric charge. It is the second-strongest of the four fundamental interactions, after the strong force, and it is the dominant force in the interactions o ...
s were known to be affected by motion. In particular, FitzGerald used some equations that had been derived a short time before by his friend the
electrical engineer Oliver Heaviside
Oliver Heaviside FRS (; 18 May 1850 – 3 February 1925) was an English self-taught mathematician and physicist who invented a new technique for solving differential equations (equivalent to the Laplace transform), independently developed vec ...
. The Dutch physicist
Hendrik Lorentz hit on a very similar idea in 1892 and developed it more fully into
Lorentz transformation
In physics, the Lorentz transformations are a six-parameter family of Linear transformation, linear coordinate transformation, transformations from a Frame of Reference, coordinate frame in spacetime to another frame that moves at a constant velo ...
s, in connection with his theory of electrons.
The
Lorentz–FitzGerald contraction
Length contraction is the phenomenon that a moving object's length is measured to be shorter than its proper length, which is the length as measured in the object's own rest frame. It is also known as Lorentz contraction or Lorentz–FitzGeral ...
(or FitzGerald–Lorentz contraction) hypothesis became an essential part of the
Special Theory of Relativity
In physics, the special theory of relativity, or special relativity for short, is a scientific theory regarding the relationship between space and time. In Albert Einstein's original treatment, the theory is based on two postulates:
# The laws o ...
, as
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...
published it in 1905. He demonstrated the kinematic nature of this effect, by deriving it from the
principle of relativity and the constancy of the speed of light.
Family
FitzGerald married, on 21 December 1885, Harriette Mary, daughter of the Reverend
John Hewitt Jellett
John Hewitt Jellett (25 December 1817 – 19 February 1888) was an Irish mathematician whose career was spent at Trinity College Dublin (TCD), where he rose to the rank of Provost. He was also a priest in the Church of Ireland.
Life
He was t ...
,
Provost of TCD and Dorothea Morris Morgan. He had eight children by her, three sons and five daughters.
FitzGerald was the nephew of
George Johnstone Stoney, the Irish physicist who coined the term "electron". After the particles were discovered by
J. J. Thomson
Sir Joseph John Thomson (18 December 1856 – 30 August 1940) was a British physicist and Nobel Laureate in Physics, credited with the discovery of the electron, the first subatomic particle to be discovered.
In 1897, Thomson showed that ...
and
Walter Kaufmann in 1896, FitzGerald was the one to propose calling them electrons. FitzGerald was also the nephew of
Bindon Blood Stoney
Bindon Blood Stoney FRS (13 June 1828, Oakley Park, County Offaly – 5 May 1909, Dublin) was an Irish engineer who also made some significant contributions to astronomy.
Family
A son of George Stoney (1792–) and Anne Blood (1801–1883), St ...
, an eminent Irish engineer. His cousin was
Edith Anne Stoney, a pioneer female medical physicist.
Flying experiments
FitzGerald, in common with others at the end of the nineteenth century, became obsessed with the desire to fly. His attempts in College Park, in Trinity College Dublin, in 1895 involved large numbers of students pulling tow-ropes attached to the
Lilienthal glider, and attracted the attention of the people of Dublin, beyond the Nassau Street railings. FitzGerald took off his coat on these occasions, but retained his top hat, which was normal headgear for a Fellow at that time.
The experiments were not crowned with success, and were eventually abandoned. The flying machine hung for many years in the Museum Building until an idle engineering student applied a match to the cord from which it was hanging. The flame travelled along the cord and consumed the glider before the helpless onlookers.
References
Bibliography
* Jarret, Philip. "Soaring Inspiration: Otto Lilienthal's Influence in Britain". ''
Air Enthusiast
''Air Enthusiast'' was a British, bi-monthly, aviation magazine, published by the Key Publishing group. Initially begun in 1974 as ''Air Enthusiast Quarterly'', the magazine was conceived as a historical adjunct to '' Air International'' maga ...
'', No. 65, September–October 1996, pp. 2–7. .
External links
*
*
FitzGerald letters at the Royal Dublin Society, with digitized images of over 2000 letters to and from FitzGerald– Genealogical Pedigree of George Francis FitzGerald
{{DEFAULTSORT:FitzGerald, George Francis
1851 births
1901 deaths
Academics of Trinity College Dublin
Alumni of Trinity College Dublin
Fellows of the Royal Society
Fellows of Trinity College Dublin
Irish relativity theorists
Presidents of the Physical Society
Royal Medal winners
Scholars of Trinity College Dublin
Burials at Mount Jerome Cemetery and Crematorium