AVS 53rd International Symposium & Exhibition November 12 -17, 2006 Moscone West Convention Center  San Francisco, CA

Benjamin Franklin and Future Science - Special Session
Thursday, November 16, 2006, 8:00 a.m. Room 2000, Moscone West Convention Center

Benjamin Franklin 1706-1790 Mason Chamberlin (1727-1787) Oil on canvas, 1762 Courtesy Philadelphia Museum of Art Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Wharton Sinkler http://www.philamuseum.org

To celebrate the 300th Anniversary of Benjamin Franklin’s birth, AVS will feature a “Special Session for the Franklin Tercentenary (1706-2006): Franklin and the Future.” The session will be on Thursday morning, November 16 at 8:00 a.m.

Scientists and historians of science agree that Franklin was not only a founding father of the United States but a founding father of modern science. Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1782 that “no one of the present age has made more important discoveries, nor has enriched philosophy with more, or more ingenious solutions of the phenomena of nature.”

By establishing that lightning is electrical and that electricity involves charge, Franklin simplified electrical theory and opened the way to new discoveries. Those discoveries in due course have led to the future-oriented science and technology presentations planned for the tercentenary session, which is co-sponsored by the AVS Vacuum Technology Division, the AVS History Committee, and the Center for the History of Physics at the American Institute of Physics.

To begin the session, a distinguished historian of science, Joyce Chaplin of Harvard University, will set the context. Her book The First Scientific American: Benjamin Franklin and the Pursuit of Genius has recently appeared. She will speak on “Benjamin Franklin’s Science-in Public and Private.”

The session will also include future-oriented presentations on:

• Monolayer Films, from Franklin’s Oil-Drop Experiment to Self-Assembled Monolayer Structures
  (G. Richmond, University of Oregon)
   
• The Outlook for Electrophotography, the Best Known Modern Application of Electrostatics
  (L.B. Schein, Consultant)
   
• From Lightning to Lighting: Physics and Technology Discharged from Franklin’s Kite Experiment
  (R. McGrath, Ohio State University)
   
• Progress and Prospects in the Generation of High Voltages
  (H.F. Dylla, Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility, Newport News, Virginia)

Sponsored by the
AVS Vacuum Technology Division
AVS History Committee
Center for the History of Physics at the American Institute of Physics
 

MAJOR Symposium Sponsors

---