For twelve years he conducted a series of experiments that were revealed to the public in A Treatise Upon New Philosophical Instruments published in In , at the age of 26, the University of Aberdeen awarded him a Doctor of Letters degree, the highest literary distinction of that era and a truly unique achievement for one of his age.
But this was not all, in , he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and the same year became editor of the Edinburgh Encyclopedia , a position he distinguished with excellence for more than 20 years. In , Brewster married Juliet McPherson.
As well as being a devoted companion, she presented him with a daughter who became the bright light of his golden years. It might be noted, however, that Sir D. Margaret M. However, it sparked an idea that produced awesome scientific results. In the course of his investigation he constructed a lens of great diameter out of one piece of glass by cutting out the central parts in successive ridges like stair steps. Thus was born an apparatus of then-unequaled power-the polyzonal lens-a lens constructed by building it on several circular segments.
This useful discovery, which created light-stabs of brilliance that could pierce far into the night, was later perfected and named after French physicist, A.
Fresnel, and resulted in the lighthouse as we know it today. This breakthrough was followed by yet other honors. Brewster was admitted to the Royal Society of London, and was later awarded the Rumford Gold and Silver Medal for his theory on the polarization of light. David Brewster was born in Jedburgh, where his father was rector of the local grammar school.
At the age of 12 he went to the University of Edinburgh to study, his family thought, for the clergy. Brewster duly obtained his theology degree and qualified to become a church minister. He never did so, however, becoming increasingly interested in the physical properties of light. William Herschel — musician and astronomer. See all related overviews in Oxford Reference ». Brewster, who was born in Jedburgh, Scotland, started by studying for the ministry at Edinburgh University but, after completing the course, he abandoned the Church for science.
He earned his living by editing various journals and spent much time popularizing science. Brewster published almost papers, mainly concerning optical measurements. He was an early worker in spectroscopy, obtaining spectra of gases and of colored glass. His most famous work was on the polarization of light. In he discovered Brewster's law , which states that if a beam of light is split into a reflected ray and a refracted ray at a glass surface, then they are polarized, and the polarization is complete when the two rays are at right angles.
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