Eugen Goldstein

Eugen Goldstein Catherine Maurer, CHEM1020 Section 91
(September 5, 1850- December 25 1930)

Eugen Goldstein studied the light emitted from a air filled glass tube when current was passed through it. He noticed that not only were their electrons and cathode rays traveling toward the positively charged end (anode), there was a third ray that traveled away from the anode end to the cathode. While observing this ray he noticed how it passed through the holes, or channels of the cathode. He named this ray the “canal ray”.
Since the canal rays traveled in different directions from the cathode rays he noted the rays must have opposite charges. Before Eugen discovered the canal ray he attended the University of Breslau in Poland for several years which also happens to be the country he was born in. He later went to work at the Berlin Observatory as a physicist in 1878, he received his doctorate in the year 1881. He finally when on to establishing his own laboratory. Shortly before his death in 1930, he became head of the astrophysical section in the Potsdam Observatory in Potsdam Germany.
Eugen was not the first to study or find light within the glass tube. A man named Michael Faraday was among the first, he noticed when current was pass through the glass tube their was an arc of light. Faraday also noticed that the arc started at the anode the positively charged end and it almost ended at the cathode end the negatively charged end of the tube.
Finding and naming the canal ray was his most significant contribution to the scientific field and opened up the door for many more scientists to improve upon his theory some of those scientist are Cromwell Fleetwood Varley and Sir Williama Crooks who both contributed to furthering the advancement of science.

References:
ClueBot last updated June 2011 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugen_Goldstein

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Last updated and Copyright ©2011 no known publisher from http://www.nndb.com/people/887/000169380/ Oracle ThinkQuest
No specific publisher a group of students from team Grzegorz last updated December 2011 from http://library.thinkquest.org/19662/low/eng/cathoderays.html

References: ClueBot last updated June 2011 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugen_Goldstein NNDB- Tracking the entire world Last updated and Copyright ©2011 no known publisher from http://www.nndb.com/people/887/000169380/ Oracle ThinkQuest No specific publisher a group of students from team Grzegorz last updated December 2011 from http://library.thinkquest.org/19662/low/eng/cathoderays.html