Ernst Abbe

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Ernst Karl Abbe HonFRMS (1840 – 1905) was a German physicist, optical scientist, entrepreneur, and social reformer.

He was born in modern optics, alongside Otto Schott and Carl Zeiss.

Several optical instruments were created by Abbe.

He was a co-owner of Carl Zeiss AG, a German manufacturer of research microscopes, astronomical telescopes, planetariums, and other optical devices.

Personal life

Abbe was born in Eisenach, Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, to Georg Adam Abbe and Elisabeth Barchfeldt on January 23rd 1840. He came from a poor family – his father was a foreman in a spinnery. Abbe was able to attend secondary school and obtain a general qualification for university entrance with very high marks at the Eisenach Gymnasium, which he graduated from in 1857. By the time he left school, his scientific ability and his strong will had already emerged. Consequently, despite the family's difficult financial situation, his father decided to encourage Abbe's study at the Universities of Jena (1857–1859) and Göttingen (1859-1881). Abbe took private lessons to increase his wealth during his time as a student. His father's employer continued to provide him with funding. On March 23, 1861, Abbe was granted his PhD in Göttingen. Bernhard Riemann and Wilhelm Weber, who also happened to be one of the Göttingen Seven, influenced him while at school. Two short stays at the Göttingen observatory and the Physikalischer Verein in Frankfurt followed, (an association of citizens interested in physics and chemistry that was established by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe in 1824 and now exists). He registered at the University of Jena on August 8, 1863, as a university lecturer. In 1870, he accepted a professor of experimental physics, mechanics, and mathematics in Jena. In 1871, he married Else Snell, the daughter of Abbe's mathematician and physicist Karl Snell, who had two children. By 1879, he had gained full professorship. In 1878, he became the head of the Jena astronomical and meteorological observatory. He became a member of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities in 1889. He was also a member of the Saxon Academy of Sciences. In 1891, he was kicked out of his teaching duties at the University of Jena. Abbe died in Jena on January 14th, 1905. He was an atheist.

Life work

He started as a research director at the Zeiss Optical Works in 1866, and it was in 1886 that he invented the apochromatic lens, a microscope lens that eliminates both primary and secondary color distortion. Abbe invented the Abbe condenser, which was used for microscope illumination by 1870. He invented the first refractometer in 1871, which he described in a book published in 1874. He invented the image of non-luminous objects by 1872. Zeiss Optical Works pioneered microscopes in 1872, by 1877, they were offering microscopes with homogenous immersion objectives, and his apochromatic objective microscopes were on sale in 1886. In terms of resolution, Abbe's measurement, a measure of any transparent material's shift in refractive index with wavelength, and Abbe's test reveals that a pattern emerges in a series of studies (see angular resolution). Carl Zeiss recruited him to improve the manufacturing process of optical instruments, which then was largely based on trial and error.

Abbe was the first to define the term numerical aperture, as the sine of the half angle was multiplied by the medium's refractive index, filling the gap between the cover glass and the front lens.

Many people are lauded for determining the microscope's resolution limit and the formula (published in 1873).

Helmholtz claims this formula was first created by Joseph Louis Lagrange, who died 61 years ago in a magazine in 1874. Helmholtz was so excited to give a professorship at the University of Berlin, but he declined due to his ties to Zeiss. Abbe was in favour of the wide open-aperturists, who claimed that microscopic resolution is ultimately limited by the aperture of the optics, but that other parameters should be considered when determining objectives are applied. Abbe's 1874 paper "A Contribution to the Theory of the Microscope and the Evolution of Microscopic Vision" states that the resolution of a microscope is inversely dependent on its aperture, but no one suggests a formula for a microscope's resolution limit.

Abbe was given a Zeiss marriage in 1876 and began to share in the vast profits. Although Eq.'s first mathematical derivations were first reported, he later derivated it. Some people have claimed that Abbe was the first to achieve this conclusion experimentally. He developed the first homogenous immersion system for the microscope in 1878. The Abbe Zeiss team's final target were of optimum ray geometry, allowing Abbe to discover that the aperture determines the upper limit of microscopic resolution, not the curvature and placement of the lenses. Eq is Abbe's first book. In 1882, 1 was born in 1882. Abbe claims that both his theoretical and experimental studies supported Eq in this collection. 1. Henry Edward Fripp, the English translator of Abbe's and Helmholtz's books, puts their contributions on equal footing. In 1884, Fizeau also perfected the espionage technique. Zeiss Zeiss, Zeiss Zeiss' son, Roderich Zeiss, and Otto Schott established in 1884 as the Jenaer Glaswerk Schott & Genossen. This business, which will in effect merge with Zeiss Optical Works, is responsible for the development and manufacturing of 44 primary types of optical glass. In 1895, he developed an image reversal device while working with telescopes.

Abbe has made significant contributions to the diagnosis and correction of optical aberrations, both spherical aberration and coma aberration, which are both essential for an aim to reach the resolution limit of Eq. 1. Abbe found that the rays in optical systems must have constant angular expansion to produce a diffraction limited spot, a phenomenon that has been described as the Abbe sine condition. Abbe's estimates and accomplishments were so important and valuable that Frits Zernike based his phase contrast study on them, for which he was honoured the Nobel Prize in 1953, and Hans Busch used them to research the electron microscope.

Not only was he at the forefront of optics research, but also labor reform was achieved during his time with Carl Zeiss' microscope research. In remembrance of his own father's 14-hour workday, he founded the social democratic Jenaige Zeitung (newspaper) in 1890 and 1900. In addition, he established a pension fund and a discharge compensation fund. Ernst Abbe founded and funded the Carl Zeiss Foundation in 1889 for science research. The foundation's mission was "to protect the jobs of their employees" in the event of economic, scientific, and technological change, as well as improving the employee's job security." He made it a point that employee's happiness was solely based on their abilities and results, not on their race, religion, or political convictions. In 1896, he reorganized the Zeiss optical company into a profit-sharing cooperative. His social convictions were so revered that they were used by the Prussian state as a model and inspiration by Alfred Weber in the 1947 book Schriften der Heidelberger Aktionsgruppe zur Demokratie und Zum Freien Sozialismus.

In honor of Abbe on the Moon, the crater was named in his honour.

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