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Charles-Augustin de Coulomb
Charles Augustin Coulomb (June 14, 1736 – August 23, 1806) was a French physicist.
Best known for the formulation of Coulomb's law, which states that the force between two electrical charges is proportional to the product of the charges and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. This force is one of the principal forces involved in atomic reactions.
Coulomb developed his law as an outgrowth of his attempt to investigate the law of electrical repulsions. To this end he invented sensitive apparatus (torsion balance) to measure the electrical forces involved and published his findings in 1785–89. He also established the inverse square law of attraction and repulsion of unlike and like magnetic poles, which became the basis for the mathematical theory of magnetic forces.
He also did research on friction of machinery, on windmills, and on the elasticity of metal and silk fibres. The coulomb, a unit of electric charge, was named in his honour.
Links:
Charles Augustin de Coulomb - MacTutor
Charles-Augustin de Coulomb - Eugenii Katz
