Evangelista Torricelli Facts
Evangelista Torricelli Facts
|
Interesting Evangelista Torricelli Facts: |
---|
He was born in Rome to Gaspare Ruberti and Giacoma Torricelli. |
Ruberti was a poor textile worker so he sent his son to Faenze to be educated by his uncle, Jacobo, a Camaldolese monk. |
Jacobo secured a sound basic education for young Torricelli and in 1624 entered him into a Jesuit College to study mathematics and philosophy. |
In 1626 Torricelli was sent to Rome to study science at the Collegio della Sapienza. |
Torricelli's teacher, Benedictine monk Benedetto Castelli, was a student of Galileo's. |
While Torricelli was his student Castelli experimented on running water and Pope Urban VIII funded his experiments with hydraulics. |
In 1632 Torricelli wrote to Galileo congratulating him on his support of the Copernican view of the solar system. |
Unfortunately that view put Galileo at odds with the Vatican and he was condemned to house arrest. |
In 1641 Castelli sent Torricelli's paper on the path of projectiles to Galileo who invited Torricelli to visit. |
After Galileo's death on 8 January 1642, the Grand Duke Ferdinano de'Medici asked Torricelli to become the grand-ducal mathematician and chair of mathematics at the University of Pisa. |
In 1644 he published his book Opera Geometrica in which he solved some of the great mathematical problems of his day. |
He designed and built several microscopes and telescopes and several large lenses can still be seen in Florence. |
He died of typhoid fever and is buried at the Basilica of San Lorenzo. |
The asteroid 7437 Torricelli and a crater on the Moon were named for him. |
Related Links: Facts Scientists Facts Animals Facts |