Innovative Tuesday: The Invention of the Thermometer

     Hello everybody and welcome back to another edition of Nations Made Fun! I'll be your host, Mr. Nations, your tour guide to this massive world we all call home! Today on Innovative Tuesday, we'll be discussing the thermometer, a useful invention in the world of science. Well, what are we waiting for? Let's dive straight into it!

     Thermometers measure temperature by using materials that in some way change when they are heated or cooled. In an old-fashioned mercury thermometer, the liquid expands when heated or chilled, so the length of the liquid in the column is longer or shorter depending on the temperature. Unfortunately, mercury thermometers are dangerous and the sale of them is forbidden as of 2006. If you or somebody you know has a mercury thermometer, please make sure that it is disposed of properly.

     A predecessor of the thermometer was the thermoscope, best described as a thermometer without the scale. A thermoscope only showed differences in temperature, for example, when an item was getting hotter or colder. It couldn't measure an exact temperature in degrees.

     Several inventors invented different versions of the thermometer and thermoscopes at bout the same time. Galileo Galilei invented a rudimentary water thermoscope, which for the first time allowed temperature to be measured.  In 1612, Italian inventor Santorio Santorio was the first to put a numerical scale on his thermometer. Neither men's instruments were very accurate. In 1654, the first enclosed liquid-in-a-glass thermometer was invented by the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Ferdinand II, using alcohol as his liquid. However, it was still inaccurate and had no standardized scale.

     Modern thermometers are accurate almost to the tee. They are safe and are able to get quick readings, unlike the bulky thermometer Santorio had invented. They no longer hold dangerous materials such as mercury in them, which is a hazard because curious children would often break the tubes and drink the fluid, making the child violently sick. We often take these small devices for granted.

     Fun Facts:

• Thermometers can also utilize alcohol to measure temperature.
• Thermometers are used in weather, science, medicine, industrial, engineering, flight, and even to measure water temperature in nuclear reactor cores.
• There are nine different types of thermometers.

     One of the first thermometers:

     

     Sources: https://www.thoughtco.com/the-history-of-the-thermometer-1992525

     https://www.softschools.com/facts/weather_instruments/thermometer_facts/3122/