Editing Walther Nernst (section)

==Life and career==

===Early years===
Nernst was born in Briesen, Germany (now [[Wąbrzeźno]], Poland) to Gustav Nernst (1827–1888) and Ottilie Nerger (1833–1876).<ref>{{cite book|last=Barkan|first=Diana|title=Walther Nernst and the transition to modern physical science|year=1999|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=Cambridge|isbn=978-0-521-44456-9}}</ref><ref>Bartel, Hans-Georg, (1999) [http://www.deutsche-biographie.de/sfz71086.html "Nernst, Walther"], pp. 66–68 in ''Neue Deutsche Biographie'', Vol. 19</ref> 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]], Germany (now [[Grudziądz]], Poland).

===Studies===

[[File:Walther Nernst.jpg|thumb|left|200px|Walther Nernst in 1889.]]
Nernst started undergraduate studies at the [[University of Zurich|University of Zürich]] in 1883, then after an interlude in [[university of Berlin|Berlin]], he returned to Zürich.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.nernst.de/|title=Walther Nernst Memorial|website=www.nernst.de}}</ref> He wrote his thesis at [[University of Graz]], where [[Ludwig Boltzmann]] was professor, though he worked under the direction of [[Albert von Ettingshausen|Albert von Ettinghausen]]. They discovered the [[Ettingshausen effect|Ettingshausen]] and [[Nernst effect]]s: that a magnetic field applied perpendicular to a metallic conductor in a temperature gradient gives rise to an electrical potential difference, reciprocally, an electric potential difference produces a thermal gradient. Next, he moved to the [[University of Würzburg]] under [[Friedrich Kohlrausch (physicist)|Friedrich Kohlrausch]] where he submitted and defended his thesis.

=== Professional career ===
[[Wilhelm Ostwald]] recruited him to the first department of physical chemistry at [[Leipzig University]]. Nernst moved there as an assistant, working on the thermodynamics of electrical currents in solutions. Promoted to lecturer, he taught briefly at the [[Heidelberg University]] and then moved to the [[University of Göttingen]]. Three years later, he was offered a professorship in [[University of Munich|Munich]]. To keep him in Prussia the government created a chair for him at Göttingen. There, he wrote a celebrated textbook ''Theoretical Chemistry'', which was translated into English, French, and Russian. He also derived the [[Nernst equation]] for the electrical potential generated by unequal concentrations of an ion separated by a membrane that is permeable to the ion. His equation is widely used in cell physiology and neurobiology.

The [[Incandescent light bulb|carbon electric filament lamp]] then in use was dim and expensive because it required a vacuum in its bulb. Nernst invented a solid-body radiator with a filament of rare-earth oxides, known as the [[Nernst lamp|Nernst glower]], it is still important in the field of [[infrared spectroscopy]]. Continuous [[Joule heating|ohmic heating]] of the filament results in conduction. The glower operates best in wavelengths from 2 to 14 micrometers. It gives a bright light but only after a warm-up period. Nernst sold the patent for one million marks, wisely not opting for royalties because soon the tungsten filament lamp filled with inert gas was introduced. With his riches, Nernst in 1898 bought the first of the eighteen automobiles he owned during his lifetime and a country estate of more than five hundred hectares for hunting. He increased the power of his early automobiles by carrying a cylinder of [[nitrous oxide]] that he could inject into the carburetor.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Cherwell|first1=F. Simon|title=Walther Nernst, 1864–1941|journal=Obit. Not. Fell. R. Soc. Lond.|date=1942|volume=4|issue=11|page=1022}}</ref> After eighteen productive years at Göttingen, investigating [[osmotic pressure]] and [[electrochemistry]] and presenting a theory of how nerves conduct, he moved to Berlin, and was awarded the title of ''[[Geheimrat]]''.

[[File:Nernst, Walther 1912.jpg|left|thumb|Nernst 1912, portrait by [[Max Liebermann]]]]

In 1905, he proposed his "New Heat Theorem", later known as the [[Third law of thermodynamics]]. He showed that as the temperature approached absolute zero, the [[entropy]] approaches zero {{mdash}} while the [[Gibbs free energy|free energy]] remains above zero. This is the work for which he is best remembered, as it enabled chemists to determine free energies (and therefore equilibrium points) of [[chemical reaction]]s from heat measurements. [[Theodore William Richards|Theodore Richards]] claimed that Nernst had stolen his idea, but Nernst is almost universally credited with the discovery.<ref>{{cite book | last=Coffey | first=Patrick| pages=[https://archive.org/details/cathedralsscienc00coff/page/n98 78]–81 | title=Cathedrals of Science: The Personalities and Rivalries That Made Modern Chemistry | url=https://archive.org/details/cathedralsscienc00coff | url-access=registration | location=Oxford | publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] | year=2008 | isbn=978-0-19-532134-0}}</ref> Nernst became friendly with [[Wilhelm I|Kaiser Wilhelm]], whom he persuaded to found the [[Kaiser Wilhelm Society|''Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft'']] for the Advancement of the Sciences with an initial capital of eleven million marks. Nernst's laboratory discovered that at low temperatures [[specific Heat|specific heats]] fell markedly and would probably disappear at absolute zero. This fall was predicted for liquids and solids in a 1909 paper of [[Albert Einstein]]'s on the [[quantum mechanics]] of specific heats at cryogenic temperatures. Nernst was so impressed that he traveled all the way to [[Zürich]] to visit Einstein, who was relatively unknown in Zürich in 1909, so people said: "Einstein must be a clever fellow if the great Nernst comes all the way from Berlin to Zürich to talk to him."<ref>{{cite book|last1=Stone|first1=A. Douglas|title=Einstein and the quantum : the quest of the valiant Swabian|url=https://archive.org/details/einsteinquantumq0000ston|url-access=registration|date=2013|publisher=Princeton University Press|page=[https://archive.org/details/einsteinquantumq0000ston/page/146 146]|isbn=9780691139685 }}</ref> Nernst and Planck lobbied to establish a special professorship in Berlin and Nernst donated to its endowment. In 1913 they traveled to Switzerland to persuade Einstein to accept it; a dream job: a named professorship at the top university in Germany, without teaching duties, leaving him free for research.<ref>Stone 2013, p. 165.</ref>

In 1911, Nernst and [[Max Planck]] organized the first [[Solvay Conference]] in Brussels. In the following year, the [[impressionist]] painter [[Max Liebermann]] painted his portrait.

=== World War I ===
In 1914, the Nernsts were entertaining co-workers and students they had brought to their country estate in a private railway car when they learned that war had been declared. Their two older sons entered the army, while thé father enlisted in the voluntary driver's corps. He supported the German army against their opponent's charges of barbarism by signing the [[Manifesto of the Ninety-Three]], On 21 August 1914, he drove documents from Berlin to the commander of the German right wing in France, advancing with them for two weeks until he could see the glow of the Paris lights at night. The tide turned at the [[First Battle of the Marne|battle of the Marne]]. When the stalemate in the trenches began, he returned home. He contacted Colonel [[Max Bauer]], the staff officer responsible for munitions, with the idea of driving the defenders out of their trenches with shells releasing tear gas.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Van der Kloot|first1=W.|title=April 1918: Five Future Nobel prize-winners inaugurate weapons of mass destruction and the academic-industrial-military complex|journal=Notes Rec. R. Soc. Lond.|date=2004|volume=58|issue=2|pages=149–160|doi=10.1098/rsnr.2004.0053|s2cid=145243958}}</ref> When his idea was tried one of the observers was [[Fritz Haber]], who argued that too many shells would be needed, it would be better to release a cloud of heavier-than-air poisonous gas; the first [[chlorine]] cloud attack on 22 April 1915 was not supported by a strong infantry thrust, so the chance that gas would break the stalemate was irrevocably gone. Nernst was awarded the [[Iron Cross]] second class. As a Staff Scientific Advisor in the [[Imperial German Army]], he directed research on explosives, much of which was done in his laboratory where they developed [[guanidine]] perchlorate. Then he worked on the development of trench mortars. He was awarded the Iron Cross first class and later the ''[[Pour le Mérite]]''. When the high command was considering unleashing unrestricted submarine warfare, he asked the Kaiser for an opportunity to warn about the enormous potential of the United States as an adversary. They would not listen, General [[Erich Ludendorff]] shouted him down for "incompetent nonsense."<ref>Mendelssohn 1973, p. 92</ref> 

=== Return to research ===
Nernst published his book ''The Foundations of the New Heat Theorem''. In 1918, after studying [[photochemistry]], he proposed the atomic chain reaction theory. It stated that when a reaction in which free atoms are formed that can decompose target molecules into more free atoms would result in a chain reaction. His theory is closely related to the natural process of [[Nuclear Fission|nuclear fission]].

In 1920, he and his family briefly fled abroad because he was one of the scientists on the [[Allies of World War I|Allied]] list of war criminals. Later that year he received the [[Nobel Prize in Chemistry]] in recognition of his work on [[thermochemistry]]. He was elected Rector of [[Humboldt University of Berlin|Berlin University]] for 1921–1922. He set up an agency to channel government and private funds to young scientists and declined becoming Ambassador to the United States. For two unhappy years, he was the president of the ''Physikalisch-Technische Reichsanstalt'' (National Physical Laboratory), where he could not cope with the "mixture of mediocrity and red tape".<ref>Mendelssohn 1973, p. 138.</ref> In 1924, he became director of the ''Institute of Physical Chemistry'' at Berlin.

In 1927, the decrease in specific heat at low temperatures was extended to gases. He studied the theories of cosmic rays and cosmology.

Although a press release described him as "completely unmusical",<ref>Mendelssohn 1973, p. 139.</ref> Nernst developed an [[electric grand piano|electric piano]], the [[Neo-Bechstein|Neo-Bechstein-Flügel]] in 1930 in association with the [[C. Bechstein Pianofortefabrik|Bechstein]] and [[Siemens]] companies, replacing the [[sounding board]] with [[Valve amplifier|vacuum tube amplifiers]]. The piano used electromagnetic [[Pick up (music technology)|pickup]]s to produce electronically modified and amplified sound in the same way as an [[electric guitar]]. In fact, he was a pianist, sometimes accompanying Einstein's violin.{{Circular reference|date=April 2018}}

=== Rejection of antisemitism ===
In 1933, Nernst learned that a colleague, with whom he had hoped to collaborate, had been dismissed from the department because he was a Jew. Nernst immediately taxied to see Haber to request a position in his Institute, which was not controlled by the government, only to learn that Haber was moving to England. Soon, Nernst was in trouble for declining to fill out a government form on his racial origins. He retired from his professorship but was sacked from the board of the [[Kaiser Wilhelm Society|Kaiser Wilhelm Institute]]. He lived quietly in the country; in 1937 he traveled to the [[University of Oxford]] to receive an honorary degree, also visiting his eldest daughter, her husband, and his three grandchildren.

=== Death ===
Nernst had a severe heart attack in 1939. He died in 1941 at Zibelle, Germany (now [[Niwica]], Poland). He was buried three times.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Laidler |first1=Keith J. |title=To Light such a Candle |date=1993 |publisher=Oxford University Press |pages=56–59}}</ref> He was buried the first time near the place of his death. However, his remains were moved to Berlin, where he was buried a second time. Finally they were moved again and buried near the graves of [[Max Planck]], [[Otto Hahn]] and [[Max von Laue]] in [[Göttingen]], Germany.<ref name="Nobel">{{Nobelprize}}</ref>