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Concept
Walther Nernst
Summary
Walther Hermann Nernst (ˈvaltɐ ˈnɛʁnst; 25 June 1864 – 18 November 1941) was a German chemist known for his work in thermodynamics, physical chemistry, electrochemistry, and solid state physics. His formulation of the Nernst heat theorem helped pave the way for the third law of thermodynamics, for which he won the 1920 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. He is also known for developing the Nernst equation in 1887.
Nernst was born in Briesen in West Prussia (now Wąbrzeźno, Poland) to Gustav Nernst (1827–1888) and Ottilie Nerger (1833–1876). His father was a country judge. Nernst had three older sisters and one younger brother. His third sister died of cholera. Nernst went to elementary school at Graudenz (now Grudziądz). He studied physics and mathematics at the universities of Zürich, Berlin, Graz and Würzburg, where he received his doctorate 1887. In 1889, he finished his habilitation at University of Leipzig.
It was said that Nernst was mechanically minded in that he was always thinking of ways to apply new discoveries to industry. His hobbies included hunting and fishing. His friend Albert Einstein was amused by "his childlike vanity and self-complacency" "His own study and laboratory always presented aspects of extreme chaos which his coworkers termed appropriately 'the state of maximum entropy'".
Nernst married Emma Lohmeyer in 1892 with whom he had two sons and three daughters. Both of Nernst's sons died fighting in World War I. With his colleagues at the University of Leipzig, Jacobus Henricus van’t Hoff and Svante Arrhenius, was establishing the foundations of a new theoretical and experimental field of inquiry within chemistry and suggested setting fire to unused coal seams to increase the global temperature. He was a vocal critic of Adolf Hitler and Nazism, and two of his three daughters married Jewish men. After Hitler came to power they emigrated, one to England and the other to Brazil.
Nernst started university at Zurich in 1883, then after an interlude in Berlin, he returned to Zurich.
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