ANTONIO PACINOTTI IN CAGLIARI

It is said that Michael Faraday (1791-1867), a genial and pragmatic scientist, but also an able speaker, during a lecture in which he was presenting his great discovery of electromagnetic induction, he was asked: "But what's all this for?".It is also said that he replied, with an implicit reference to the potential of scientific discoveries, with another question:"What's a baby for?";

It was Antonio Pacinotti (1841-1912) some thirty years later who demonstrated the magnitude of the potentiality of Faraday's discovery by being the first, with genial intuition, to come up with the conceptual and practical solution to the problem of the electromagnetic production of currents of practically constant intensity and that of the production of mechanical work using direct current.

For the creation of the ring machine, of which he had demonstrated the reversibility, and for later improvements and applications, Antonio Pacinotti occupies a position of absolute importance not only in the history of physics, but also in that of technology.

Antonio Pacinotti performed a not negligible part of his activity as a scientist and inventor, as well as professor, in Cagliari.

He was appointed Professor of Experimental Physics and Director of the annexed Physics Laboratory of the Royal University of Cagliari with a decree dated 30 March 1873 and remained as a professor in Cagliari up to 31 December 1881. ...continues