User:ChristianSmay/AgnesPockels

Agnes Luise Wilhelmine Pockels (February 14th, 1862 - November 21st 1935) was a chemist and German pioneer. Her work covered a lot of the fundamental work known for surface science. This term describes the properties of liquid and solid surfaces. Agnes got interested in these properties early on from washing dishes.

Early Life

Agnes Pockels was born in Venice Italy on the 14th of February in 1862 and died in November of 1935. Agnes moved in 1871 to Brunswick, Lower Saxony, which was part of the nascent German Empire. There, Pockels attended the Municipal High School for Girls. Chemistry from her interest in science as a child. Growing up for Agnes, women were not allowed to enter universities to study. Pockels mentioned that "I had a passionate interest in natural science, especially physics, and would have liked to study“ (Agnes Pockels) in Autobiographical Notes in W. Ostwald (1932).

Middle Life

Agnes Pockels younger brother Friedrich, however, also wanted to study physics and took a degree at the University of Göttingen. Friedrich would take textbooks for the university and send them to Agnes to help her study from home. Pockels published her first paper, "Surface Tension" with the help of John William Strutt, 3rd Baron Rayleigh in 1891. After this was released, her study of surface films started to take off. Later on, she continued to publish a lot of different papers and eventually recognized as a Surface science pioneer. It was known that Pockels sent a letter to Rayleigh after reading about his Results in “Naturwissenschaftliche Rundschau”. Pockels also submitted a lot of her papers to German journals while watching after her sick parents. Agnes brother, Friedrich Carl Alwin Pockels died in 1913. Later on, she realizes she had lost all contact to her field and no longer had contact with interest in her field.

Later Life

Agnes developed a love for surface science by doing the dishes one day at home. She was reported to be a caretaker of her parents. Pockels spent much time cooking and cleaning with various oils, soaps, and other household products. She starting finding out to to measure the surface tension of water by coming up with an apparatus known as the Pockels trough, a key instrument in the new discipline of surface science. There was also a scientist who used this apparatus as a model to create his own and win a Nobel Piece Prize. Pockels spent the lat leg of her life caring for her sick parents which she noted to be "very challenging". During Pockels later years, she lived as an aunt known as "Auntie Agnes."

Career and Recognition

Agnes Pockels primary study was with Surface science; however, she was also interested in chemistry and physics as well. Pockels was an early experimenter with surface science and physics. Pockels supposedly studied Surface tension a lot and put almost 10 years of studies into one journal. Agnes Pockels was generally interested in her studies from the "support of Lord Rayleigh and the publications in Nature." Agnes Pockels had a lot of late recognition when she was older. She was a nominee in the Annual Laura-R.-Leonard Prize. She was also the first women to win the "Dr. h. c. from the Technical University Braunschweig" on her 70th birthday.

Publications

• Surface Tension, (1891) Natur, 46, 437.
• On the relative contamination of the water surace by equal quantities of different substances, (1892) Nature 47, 418.
• Relations between the surface tension and relative contamination of water surfaces, (1893) Nature, 48, 152.
• On the spreading of oil upon water, (1894) Nature 50, 223.
• Beobachtungen über die Adhäsion verschiedener Flüssigkeiten an Glas, (Observations about the Adhesion of Different Liquids on Glass), (1898) Naturwissenschaftliche Rundschau, 14, 190.
• Randwinkel gesättigter Lösungen an Kristallen (Contact Angles of Saturated Solutions on Crystals), (1899), Naturwissenschaftliche Rundschau, 14, 383.
• Untersuchungen von Grenzflächenspannungen mit der Cohäsionswaage, (Investigations of the Surface Tension with the Cohesion Balance), (1899) Annalen der Physik, 67, 668.
• Über das spontane Sinken der Oberflächenspannung von Wasser, wässerigen Lösungen und Emulsionen, (On the Spontaneous Decrease of the Surface Tension of Water, Aqueous Solutions and Emulsions), (1902) Annalen der Physik, 8, 854.
• Über Randwinkel und Ausbreitung von Flüssigkeiten auf festen Körpern (On Contact Angles and the Flow of Fluids on Solid Bodies), (1914) Physikalische Zeitschrift, 15, 39.
• Zur Frage der zeitlichen Veränderung der Oberflächenspannung (On the Changes of the Surface Tension with Time), (1916) Physikalische Zeitschrift, 17, 141
• Über die Ausbreitung reiner und gemischter Flüssigkeiten auf Wasser (On the Spreading of Pure and Mixed Liquids on Water) (1916) Physikalische Zeitschrift, 17, 142.
• Die Anomalie der Wasseroberfläche (The Anomalous State of the Water Surface) (1917) Die Naturwissenschaften, 5, 137 u. 149.
• Zur Frage der Ölflecke auf Seen (On Oil Stains on Lakes) (1918) Die Naturwissenschaften, 6, 118.
• The measurement of surface tension with the balance (1926) Science 64, 304.

Education

• Municipal High School for Girls
• University of Göttingen (From Brother)