Robert Hooke Biography

Robert Hooke was born on 18 July 1635. He died on 3 March 1703. He was active among the people like scientists and architects. He was the first person to see microorganisms using a microscope. He was a scientist of the Young adult poverty society and achieved wealth and respect when performing more than half of the architectural survey after the great fire in London. Robert Hooke was also a member of the Royal Society and since 1662 was an experimental factor. Hooke also had geometric teachers at Gresham College. Hooke built a vacuum pump and used it in the Ville experiment.  In 1673, he built a former Gregorio telescope and then observed the rotation of the planets Mars and Jupiter. In geology and paleoecology, Hooke gave Cervelo Theory, which resolves the literary biblical vision of the Earth's age, assuming the extinction of the species, and the hills and mountain fossils increased by geological processes. We will learn more about Robert Hooke contribution to science and Robert Hooke inventions in this autobiography of Robert Hooke. 

About Robert Hooke

Robert Hooke scientist was born in 1635 in Freshwater. The parents of Robert Hooke went to various schools for his admissions. Robert was attracted by the observations, and the works of the machine,s and their drawings. He dismantled a brass watch and built a wooden replica that worked very well. He made his carbon drawing material with chalk and Radiol. Radiol is an ore of iron. He started taking part in the science experiments that were performed in school and also gave them a new look with his creative ideas. This marks his lifelong love and study of mechanics which resulted in many discoveries. He discovered the microscope that was used by him to observe cells. We will further understand more about who is Robert Hooke and Robert Hooke discovery. 

Figure: Robert Hooke

Hooke’s Contribution to Mechanics 

Hooke discovered the Law of Elasticity that is further named on his name only. This law represents the linear fluctuation of tension with the elongation of elastic spring. Hooke became the experimental curator of the newly created Royal Society in 1662 and was responsible for the experiments conducted at their weekly meeting. This is the position he has held for more than 40 years. Although this position allowed him to maintain a leadership position in the scientific community in the United Kingdom and other regions, it also led to some fierce debates with other scientists, such as Huygens, especially with Isaac Newton and Royal Henry Oldenburg of Society. In 1664, Hooke was also appointed Professor of Geometry at Gresham College, London, and Professor of Mechanics at Cutlery.

Hooke's Work in Astronomy 

One of the most challenging problems Hooke solved was measuring the distance to the stars. The selected star was Draco Gamma and the method used was the parallax measurement. After several months of observation, in 1669, Hooke believed that the expected result had been achieved. It is now well known that Hooke's equipment is too inaccurate to make successful measurements. Gamma Draconis and James Bradley used the same stars when they discovered aberrations of light in 1725. Hooke's astronomical activities go beyond the study of stellar distance. His micrographs include illustrations of the Pleiades star cluster and lunar craters. He conducted experiments to study how these craters formed. Hooke was also one of the first observers of Saturn's rings, and in 1664 he discovered one of the first observed binary star systems, Gamma Aries.

Hooke's Work on the Microscope 

Robert Hooke’s discovery was published in Hooke's book "Micrographs". It was published in 1665. This book describes observations with microscopes and telescopes and original works of biology, including the first observed microorganisms, a species of micro Fungus Mucor. Hooke coined the term cell to indicate that the structure of plants is similar to honeycomb cells. The handmade leather and gold tool microscope that he used to observe Micrographia was originally built by Christopher White in London and is currently on display at the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Maryland. Micrographia also contains the ideas of Hooke or Boyle on burning. Hooke's experiments led him to conclude that combustion involves a substance mixed with air. Modern scientists would agree with this statement, but in the 17th century, if anything, it was not widely understood. Hooke concluded that respiration also involves specific components of air. Paddington even stated that if "Hooker continues his combustion experiment, he is likely to find oxygen." 

Hooke's Research on Human Memory 

In a lecture to the Royal Society in 1682, Robert Hooke, in Biology proposed a mechanical model of human memory, which bears little resemblance to the earlier major philosophical models. The model addresses the components of encoding, memory capacity, repetition, retrieval, and forgetting, some of which have amazing modern precision. This work had been neglected for nearly 200 years. It has many similarities with Richard Semon's 1919/1923 work, assuming that memory is physical and located in the brain. The most interesting point of this model is that it allows attention and other top-down coding influences and uses resonance to achieve signal-dependent parallel recovery. It also provides an explanation for a single repetition and activation system, and the power law of forgetting can be derived from model assumptions in a simple manner. This lecture was published after his death in 1705 because the memory model is unusually placed in a series of works on the nature of light. Presumably, this work has hardly been revised, because printing was in small batches in the post-Newtonian scientific era and may be considered outdated at the time of publication. What further hinders its success is the rejection of immaterial souls by contemporary memory psychologists. To a certain extent, Hooke invoked information about the process of attention, coding, and retrieval.

Hooke’s Architecture

As per Robert Hooke information available, he was a surveyor in the City of London and the chief assistant of Christopher Wren. He helped Wren rebuild London after the fire in 1666 and participated in the design of the London Fire Monument. The Royal Greenwich Observatory, Montague House in Bloomsbury, and the Royal Hospital in Belim were designed with the help of Hooke. Other buildings designed by Hooke include the Royal College of Physicians (1679), Ragley Hall in Warwickshire, Ramsbury Manor in Wiltshire, and Milton Keynes in Buckinghamshire. The Parish Church of St. Mary Magdalene was also designed by Hooke. Hooke’s collaboration with Christopher Wren also includes St. Paul’s Cathedral, whose dome uses Hooke’s conceived construction method. He also participated in the design of the Pepys Library, which contained the manuscript of the diary of Samuel Pepys, the eyewitness of the London fire.

Hooke’s Work at the Royal Society 

Hooke’s role at the Royal Society was to demonstrate experiments in his own way or at the suggestion of members. His early demonstrations included discussing the properties of air, the implosion of a glass bubble sealed with sufficient hot air, and the same demonstration of Pabulum vitae. He also showed that by pumping air in and out of the lungs and paying attention to the difference between venous blood and arterial blood, dogs can stay alive with their chests open. Experiments were performed on gravity, falling objects, weighing objects, and measuring air pressure on pendulums at different heights and up to 200 feet in length. The instrument was designed to measure the arc-second in the motion of the sun or other stars, and to measure the force of gunpowder, especially a motor that cuts teeth for a clock. It is much more delicate than manual handling. Hooke performed his microscopic observations in 1663 and 1664, which were later incorporated into Micrographia in 1665.

This is Robert Hooke biography. This helps us understand who is Robert Hooke and also Robert Hooke discovery. He undoubtedly was one of the greatest minds of his time and made immense contributions to the fields of Physics, Astronomy and Biology.