Pieter van Musschenbroek (14 March 1692 – 19 September 1761) was a Dutch scientist. He was a professor in Duisburg, Utrecht, and Leiden, where he held positions in mathematics, philosophy, medicine, and astronomy. He is credited with the invention of the first capacitor in 1746: the Leyden jar. He performed pioneering work on the buckling of compressed struts. Musschenbroek was also one of the first scientists (1729) to provide detailed descriptions of testing machines for tension, compression, and flexure testing.[1][2] An early example of a problem in dynamic plasticity was described in the 1739 paper (in the form of the penetration of butter by a wooden stick subjected to impact by a wooden sphere).
Early life and studies
Pieter van Musschenbroek was born on 14 March 1692 in Leiden, Holland, Dutch Republic. His father was Johannes van Musschenbroek and his mother was Margaretha van Straaten. The van Musschenbroeks, originally from Flanders, had lived in the city of Leiden since circa 1600.[3] His father was an instrument maker, who made scientific instruments such as air pumps, microscopes, and telescopes.[4]
Musschenbroek belonged to the tradition of Dutch thinkers who popularised the ontological argument of God's design.[7] He is author of Oratio de sapientia divina (Prayer of Divine Wisdom. 1744).
In 1723, he left his posts in Duisburg and became professor at the University of Utrecht. In 1726 he also became professor in astronomy.[8] Musschenbroek's Elementa Physica (1726) played an important part in the transmission of Isaac Newton's ideas in physics to Europe.[6] In November 1734 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.[9]
Leiden
An early 20th-century illustration of a Leyden jar.
Already during his studies at Leiden University, van Musschenbroek became interested in electrostatics. At that time, transient electrical energy could be generated by friction machines but there was no way to store it. Musschenbroek and his student Andreas Cunaeus discovered that the energy could be stored, in work that also involved Jean-Nicolas-Sébastien Allamand as collaborator.[11] The apparatus was a glass jar filled with water into which a brass rod had been placed; and the stored energy could be released only by completing an external circuit between the brass rod and another conductor, originally a hand, placed in contact with the outside of the jar. Van Musschenbroek communicated this discovery to René Réaumur in January 1746, and it was Abbé Nollet, the translator of Musschenbroek's letter from Latin, who named the invention the 'Leyden jar'.[12]
Soon afterwards, it transpired that a German scientist, Ewald Georg von Kleist, had independently constructed a similar device in late 1745, shortly before Musschenbroek.[13]
He made a significant contribution to the field of tribology.[14]
Beginsels der Natuurkunde, Beschreeven ten dienste der Landgenooten, door Petrus van Musschenbroek, Waar by gevoegd is eene beschryving Der nieuwe en onlangs uitgevonden Luchtpompen, met haar gebruik tot veel proefnemingen (1736 / 1739)[15]
Aeris praestantia in humoribus corporis humani (1739)[6]
De fluido (in Latin). Leiden: Gerrit Potvliet. 1743.
^van Musschenbroek, P. (1739). Essai de Physique, Vol. 1 (translated by P.Massuet). Leyden.
^Bell, James F. (1971), "The experimental foundations of solid mechanics", in Truesdell, Clifford A. (ed.), Handbuch der Physik, vol. VI a/1, Berlin: Springer Verlag
^David C. Lindberg, Ronald L. Numbers. God and Nature: Historical Essays on the Encounter Between Christianity and Science. University of California Press. p. 263
^Wiep van Bunge et al. (editors), The Dictionary of Seventeenth and Eighteenth-Century Dutch Philosophers (2003), Thoemmes Press (two volumes), article Allamand, Jean Nicolas Sébastien, p. 5–6.
