WILHELM RÖNTGEN: BIOGRAPHY, CONTRIBUTIONS AND WORKS - ARTE - 2024

Wilhelm Röntgen (1845 - 1923) was a German physical and mechanical engineer known for producing and detecting electromagnetic radiation in a wavelength range known as X-rays or Röntgen rays.

This earned him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1901, as well as other important distinctions such as the presidency of the Mexican Society of Radiology and Imaging (1915).

Thanks to Röntgen, medicine was able to observe the interior of bodies and thus be able to carry out diagnostic imaging. With his contribution, the German physicist revolutionized diagnostic medicine and gave way to modern physics.

Biography

Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen was born on March 27, 1845 in Lennep, a municipality of the former Kingdom of Prussia that is currently part of Remsheid (Germany). The son of a German weaver and a Dutch mother, he moved with his family at an early age to the Netherlands.

Specifically, they settled in Apeldoorn, where he began his studies at the Martinus Herman van Doorn Institute. During this stage he showed certain gifts for the manufacture and manipulation of mechanical devices, as well as a certain love for nature.

Academic training

His father wanted him to take over the family business after finishing his secondary studies, but the young Röntgen decided to continue his training and in 1862, at the age of 17, he entered the Technical School in Utrecht.

In this center he was barely three years due to a misunderstanding. Apparently they found a distasteful caricature of a teacher at the center, Röntgen being accused of being the one who made it.

Despite the fact that the sketch was made by someone else, his innocence was not believed and he was expelled from the center. This meant a blemish on his record and the loss of credentials, which prevented him from attending Utrecht University, for example.

For this reason, he enrolled at the Federal Polytechnic Institute in Zurich, where he obtained very good marks as a mechanical engineering student.

Doctorate in Zurich

In 1869 he also got a doctorate at the University of Zurich, which gave him the opportunity to work as an assistant to August Kundt (1839 - 1894), a notable German physicist of the time who opened the doors for his development as a scientist.

Since then, he has served as a professor at different academic institutions such as the University of Strasbourg (1874), the Hohenheim Academy of Agriculture in Württemberg (1875) or the University of Giessen (1879-1888), where he was appointed to the chair of physics.

At Giessen he had the opportunity to make a name for himself as an excellent researcher and a demanding person with his work. In fact, few students attended their practices due to the complexity of the experimental physics that they developed in their classes. He was a key figure for the theory of electromagnetism that flourished in those years coinciding with the Second Scientific Revolution.

University of Würzburg

He established himself more stably at the University of Würzburg (1888 - 1899), where he met illustrious physicians and physicists such as Hermann von Helmholtz.

Interested in cathode radiation, in a climate of great competition between various nations to advance technology, it was at this time that Wilhelm Röntgen carried out his great milestone: the discovery of X-rays.

Discovery of X-rays

Although it is not very clear what the methodology was when it came to finding out these electromagnetic waves, the most established idea was due to an error by an assistant who is a fan of photography.

Apparently one day he brought Röntgen some photographic plates (all made of glass) that had been mistakenly veiled without anyone acting on them. This inspired the physicist to ask himself how that inexplicable event happened.

He noticed that those plates had been locked in a drawer covered with black paper. And on top of that drawer there was a cathode tube that could be responsible for the veiling.

He got down to work and for weeks he was investigating how supposedly that ray had veiled the photographic plates. He named that ray X-ray, being the name that remains today.

On November 8, 1895, he discovered that if the cathode discharge tube was enclosed in a dark box where light would not enter and he placed paper covered by barium platinocyanide, it would become fluorescent when exposed to the cathode tube.

Advance your experiments

He delved deeper into his experiments and radiographed his and his wife's hand. In his wife's, the shadows thrown by the bones and that of a ring, more permeable to rays and therefore casting a weaker light, were captured.

Anna Bertha, his wife, when she saw the skeleton of his hand, was so scared that she thought she had seen death.

The German physicist carried out his experiments in total secrecy for fear of being wrong and risking his reputation. Finally, on December 28, 1895, he made his discovery public and showed the world the technology that will change clinical diagnosis.

Curiously, the Lumière brothers presented their first film screening in Paris that same day. Two historical events that changed the contemporary life of many people.

Honors

Thanks to this milestone, Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen was awarded various honors such as the Rumford Medal (1896), the Matteucci Medal (1896) or the Elliott Cresson Medal (1897). But, undoubtedly, the highest award he won was the recently established Nobel Prize in Physics "for the discovery of the remarkable rays that bear his name."

And it is that X-rays are known in some nations as Röntgenstrahlen (Röntgen rays), although the author himself always denied that they were called that. In fact, it refused to carry out any kind of patent for ethical reasons.

Last years

Despite the distinction he earned for his discovery, Röntgen did not live the last years of his life peacefully. Married to the aforementioned Anna Bertha Ludwig and with an adopted daughter since he was six years old, World War I was a setback for the family.

Inflation caused Röntgen to go bankrupt and had to move to live in a country house in Weilheim, in German Bavaria. He died in Munich on February 10, 1923 due to bowel cancer. His wife died years before and his social circle was gradually diminishing, dying practically alone.

Contributions

With the discovery of X-rays, doctors began to attend physics institutes, where there are devices prepared for clinical diagnosis. As the number of patients increased, equipment for hospitals and health centers was soon being manufactured.

The use of electromagnetic radiation expanded and during World War I it was an effective instrument for detecting foreign bodies and diagnosing injuries. In turn, Marie Curie developed an ambulance that carried mobile radiology.

Although X-rays gave rise to benefits such as those mentioned above, it also caused constant exposure to them by medical professionals or dentists to cause serious diseases such as leukemia. Security protocols were improved starting in the 1920s.

In turn, X-rays have been used to maintain the security of banks, government institutions or airports; they have been used in engineering or architecture for the elaboration of turbines, motors, beams or the verification of materials; they have helped to understand certain genetic processes and, of course, it was the precedent of such important technologies as computed tomography.

Its use continues to be very important today and in the development of future technologies.

Works and published works

The first works of the mechanical engineer were published in 1870. In them he investigated the heats of gases or the thermal conductivity of crystals.

He also carried out studies on electrical characteristics, pressure on refractive indices in fluids or variations in temperature and compressibility of water.

However, Röntgen decided that much of his work would be burned after his death, since much of these documents and notes contained confidentiality and personal matters.

This protection of your privacy has contributed to many speculations about the origin of your discovery and the reconstruction of your facts.

Über eine neue Art von Strahlen (On a New Kind of Rays) published on December 28, 1895, is his most important legacy. He complemented it with two other articles where he talked about X-rays and which he developed between 1895 and 1897.

This article, along with others of less importance, as well as the Nobel Prize in Physics, he donated to his beloved University of Würzburg before he passed away.

Röntgen was a scientist who revolutionized society with his discovery, but who always lived away from the desire for prominence due to his shyness and humility. He preferred to work alone and where he was most comfortable was walking through forests, meadows or mountaineering.

References

1. Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen. Bigraphical. Extracted from nobelprize.org.
2. Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica (2019). Wilhem Conrad Röntgen. Extracted from britannica.com.
3. Wilhelm Röntgen. Extracted from Wikipedia.org.
4. Busch, U. (2016). Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen. The discovery of x-rays and the creation of a new medical profession. Extracted from elsevier.es.