Online Encyclopedia

Search over 40,000 articles from the original, classic Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th Edition.

THERMOMETRY (Gr. Bepµos, warm; µerpov...

Online Encyclopedia
Originally appearing in Volume V26, Page 822 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
Spread the word: del.icio.us del.icio.us it!

See also:

THERMOMETRY (Gr. Bepµos, warm; µerpov, a measure)  , the See also:art of measuring temperature or degree of See also:heat . The See also:instruments used for this purpose are known as thermometers, or sometimes, when the temperatures to be measured are high, as pyrometers . 1 . A brief See also:sketch of the See also:evolution of the thermometer is included in the See also:article HEAT, §§ 2 and 3 . The See also:object of thepresent article is to discuss the See also:general principles on which the accurate measurement of temperature depends, and to describe the application of these principles to the construction and use of the most important types of thermometer . See also:Special See also:attention will be devoted to more See also:recent advances in scientific methods of testing thermometers and to the application of See also:electrical and See also:optical methods to the difficult problem of measuring high temperatures . In the article See also:PYROMETER an See also:account will be found of some of the thermoscopic methods employed in the arts for determining high temperatures . 2 . Zero: Fundamental See also:Interval.—In all systems of measuring temperature it is necessary (I) to choose a zero or starting-point from which to reckon, (2) to determine the See also:size of the degree by subdividing the interval between two selected fixed points of the See also:scale (called the " fundamental interval ") into a given number of equal parts . The fundamental interval selected is that between the temperature of melting See also:ice and the temperature of condensing See also:steam, under See also:standard atmospheric pressure . On the Centigrade See also:system the fundamental interval is divided into See also:loo parts, and the melting-point of ice is taken as the zero of the scale . We shall denote temperature reckoned on this system by the See also:letter t, or by affixing the letter C .

It is often convenient to reckon temperature, not from the melting-point of ice, but from a theoretical or See also:

absolute zero representing the lowest conceivable temperature . We shall denote temperature reckoned in this manner by the letter T, or 0, or by affixing the letters Abs . In practice, since the absolute zero is unattainable, the absolute temperature is deduced from the Centigrade temperature by adding a See also:constant quantity, To, representing the interval between the absolute zero and the melting-point of ice; thus T=t+To . 3 . Arbitrary Scales.—An arbitrary scale can be constructed by selecting any See also:physical See also:property of a substance which varies regularly with the temperature, such as the See also:volume of a liquid, or the pressure or See also:density of a See also:gas, or the electrical resistance of a See also:metal . Thus if V denote the volume of a given See also:mass at the temperature t, and if Vo, VI represent the volumes of the same mass at the temperatures o° and See also:roe C., the size of re C. on the scale of this arbitrary thermometer is one hundredth See also:part of the fundamental interval, namely (V,—Vo)/loo, and the temperature t at volume V is the number of these degrees contained in the expansion V—Vo between o° and t° C . We thus arrive at the See also:formula t= too (V—Vo)/(Vi—Vo) . . (I), which is the general expression for the temperature Centigrade on any such arbitrary scale, provided that we substitute for V the particular physical property selected as the basis of the scale . If we prefer to reckon temperature from an arbitrary zero defined by the vanishing of V, which may conveniently be called the fundamental zero of the scale considered, we have, putting V=o in See also:equation (I), the numerical values of the fundamental zero To, and of the temperature T reckoned from this zero To=looVo/(V,—Vo), and T=.ToV/Vo=t+To . . (2) . It is frequently convenient to measure temperature in this manner when dealing with gases, or electrical resistance thermometers . 4 .

Absolute Scale.—It is necessary for theoretical purposes to reduce all experimental results as far as possible to the absolute scale, defined as explained in HEAT, § 21, on the basis of See also:

Carnot's principle, which is See also:independent of the properties of any particular substance . Temperature on this scale measured from the absolute zero will be denoted by the letter B . This scale can be most nearly realized in practice by observing the temperature T on the scale of a gas-thermometer, and making special experiments on the gas to determine how far its scale deviates from that of the thermodynamical See also:engine . In the See also:case of the gases See also:hydrogen and See also:helium, which can exist in the liquid See also:state only at very See also:low temperatures, the deviations from the absolute scale at See also:ordinary temperatures are so small that they cannot be certainly determined . Thermometers containing these gases are generally taken as the ultimate See also:standards of reference in See also:practical See also:thermometry .

End of Article: THERMOMETRY (Gr. Bepµos, warm; µerpov, a measure)
[back]
THERMOELECTRICITY
[next]
THERMOPYLAE (Gr. OepµSs, hot, and 1rf)X,

Additional information and Comments

There are no comments yet for this article.
» Add information or comments to this article.
Please link directly to this article:
Highlight the code below, right click and select "copy." Paste it into a website, email, or other HTML document.