J.J. Thomson Science lecturers who traveled from town to town in the middle nineteenth century delighted audiences by showing them the ancestor of the neon sign. They took a glass tube with wires embedded in opposite ends . . . put a high voltage across . . . pumped out most of the air . . . and the interior of the tube would glow in lovely patterns. In 1859 a German physicist sucked out still more air with an improved pump and saw that where this light from the cathode reached the glass it produced a fluorescent glow. Evidently the cathode emitted some kind of ray that was illuminating the glass. What could these rays be? One possibility was that they were waves traveling in a hypothetical invisible fluid called the ether (similar to the quintessence of Aristotle). At that time, many physicists thought that this ether was needed to carry light waves through apparently empty s....

Number Of Pages: 5

Number Of Words: 1315

Got a term paper due soon and need some help quick? You have come to the right place. Essay Galaxy has over 50,000 essays, papers, and reports available for download right now! Get ideas from thousands students just like you to help make that essay perfect. Don't hesitate. Join today and get instant access to our enormous database.

Membership Options Price Savings   1 month subscription    $19.95 recurring * 3 months subscription    $39.95 recurring $19.90 6 months subscription    $69.95 non-recurring $49.75