James Prescott Joule Biography

James Prescott Joule was an English physicist, best known for establishing the relationship between mechanical work and heat transfer. This study later led to discovery of the ‘The ‘Law of Conservation of Energy’ which states that ‘Energy can neither be created nor be destroyed; it can only be transferred from one form to another’. He was a creative and confident child, fascinated with heat and electricity from his early years. Most of his knowledge regarding electricity and magnetism was self-taught through which he created a mark for himself in scientific history. After years of research, he designed an experiment which led to the discovery of the first law of thermodynamics, which is still considered one of the major breakthroughs in field of heat transfer study. The S. I. unit for measuring energy, Joule, named after him, highlights the significance of his contribution to physics and its various branches. Along with Lord Kelvin, he also developed the absolute scale of temperature and discovered the Joule-Thomson effect.. Even though he was a man of science, he had a religious and spiritual personality. He had an unparalleled devotion towards nature’s beauty and the laws that govern it.