He became professor of experimental physics, first at Palermo and then at Rome, and was appointed to a similar situation at Turin in 1748. He was afterwards made tutor to the young princes de Chablais and de Carignan, and continued to reside principally at Turin during the remainder of his life. In May 1755 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of London, and published several papers on electrical subjects in the Phil. Trans.
Beccaria did much, in the way both of experiment and exposition, to spread a knowledge of the electrical researches of Franklin and others. His principal work was the treatise Dell’ Elettricismo Naturale ed Artificiale (1753), which was translated into English in 1776.
GiovanniBattistaBeccaria (October 3, 1716 – May 27, 1781), Italian physicist, was born at Mondovi, and entered the religious order of the Pious Schools in 1732.
He became professor of experimental physics, first at Palermo and then at Rome, and was appointed to a similar situation at Turin in 1748.
Beccaria did much, in the way both of experiment and exposition, to spread a knowledge of the electrical researches of Franklin and others.
Beccaria confirmed the observation of Andrew Gordon that water evaporates more rapidly when electrified; also the conclusion of Abbés Nollet and Menon that animals (cats, pigeons, chaffinches) lose weight when subjected to prolonged electrification, the loss being ascribed to increased "transpiration" under electrical stimulus.
Beccaria adopted the two-fluid theory of Franklin as well as the views of the American philosopher on the preventive and protective functions of lightning conductors.
In 1755Beccaria was elected Fellow of the Royal Society, and in 1766 he contributed a paper to the "Philosophical Transactions", in which he describes (in Latin) five of the more important of his experimental researches.
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