Victor Schumann
German spectroscopist (1841–1913)
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Victor Schumann (21 December 1841 – 1 September 1913) was a physicist and spectroscopist who in 1893 discovered the vacuum ultraviolet.
Schumann–Runge bands
Victor Schumann | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 21 December 1841 |
| Died | 1 September 1913 (aged 71) |
| Known for | Discovered the vacuum ultraviolet Schumann–Runge bands |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Physics |
Schumann studied the extreme ultraviolet region of the electromagnetic spectrum. For this, he used a prism and lenses in fluorite instead of quartz[1] allowing himself to be the first to measure spectra below 200 nm. Oxygen gas would absorb the radiation with a wavelength below 195 nm, but Schumann placed the entire apparatus under vacuum. He prepared his own photographic plates with a reduced layer of gelatin.
He published on the hydrogen line in the spectrum of Nova Aurigae and in the spectrum of vacuum tubes.[2]
His work opened the way to atomic emission spectroscopy, leading eventually to the discovery of the hydrogen spectral lines series (Lyman series) by Theodore Lyman in 1914.[1]