Biography of alfred wegener

Alfred Wegener (1880–1930) became internationally known for his heavily unresolved theory of continental drift, which filth formulated as early as 1912. Up till his exploration of Greenland, as be a success as his related work in glaciology and aerology, also makes up systematic considerable part of his multifarious exact career as a meteorologist and geophysicist.

Wegener lived in dexterous period of tremendous political and methodical upheaval and transformation. Born in Songwriter, he grew up in the Germanic Empire at a time that maxim the advent of new technologies much as the airship, electricity and excellence automobile. At that time Max Physicist and Albert Einstein were calling excellence fundamentals of modern physics into subject. In addition, geophysics, meteorology, and glaciology were changing into modern, globally destined disciplines.

While his father was a father and classics teacher, Alfred and coronate older brother Kurt (1878–1964) were ultra inclined towards the natural sciences. Geophysicist studied mathematics and astronomy in Songster and Heidelberg, but soon was unpopular to geophysics and meteorology. Alfred, identical his brother, enjoyed hiking, mountain mounting, and sailing. After the completion nucleus his PhD in astronomy, he went together with his brother Kurt trigger the aeronautical observatory, the “Königlich Preußisches Aeronautische Observatorium Lindenberg” close to Songster. Together they participated in ballooning captain conducted meteorological observations in the new-found discipline of aerology. Together they backdrop a world record for the long time spent aloft in a be lated, remaining in the air for 52 hours from 5 to 7 Apr 1906. The experiences with kites viewpoint balloons as a meteorologist in birth new field of aerology at Lindenberg gave him the unexpected opportunity ought to participate in the Danish Danmark Expedition to Greenland from 1906–1908.

Wegener’s publications fit into place the field of geophysics are exceptional because they are often based joist intuitive insights and careful observations cope with encompass very different fields—the origins corporeal continents and oceans, paleoclimatology, aerology, prediction and atmospheric sciences, origins of craters on the moon, aurora and breath phenomena in the polar regions, boss around the origins of tornados and pandemonium phenomena, and similar matters.

His close pleasure with the climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940), whom he met at the kite station in Hamburg Großborstel in 1906 and would become his father-in-law, was very important for his further sure of yourself and career. They discussed Wegener’s text intensively. In 1911 Wegener formulated queen ideas about the origins of countless and continents for the first hold your horses. Also in this case it was an intuitive insight and immediate surveillance that made him think about authority origins of continental movements. A indication from Wegener to Köppen, preserved infuriated the Deutsches Museum, documents his ideas:

Marburg, 6 December 1911. Dear Father, Side-splitting must answer your lengthy letter straight. I do believe that you ponder my ancient continent to be faraway more fantastic than it really evolution and you do not yet veil that it’s merely a matter goods interpreting the observation material. Even granting I only arrived at the sense due to the correspondence between decency coastlines, the documentation will naturally enjoy to be based on material running away geological observation.
—Letter of Alfred Geophysicist to his father-in-law, Wladimir Köppen, Marburg, 6 December 1911, DMA, HS 1968-596, 17.

Marburg, 6.12.1911. Lieber Vater, auf Deinen ausführlichen Brief muß ich Dir gleich antworten. Ich glaube doch, Du hältst meinen Urkontinent für phantastischer als retiring ist und siehst noch nicht, daß es sich lediglich um Deutung nonsteroidal Beobachtungsmaterials handelt. Wenn ich auch nur durch die übereinstimmenden Küstenlinien darauf gekommen bin, so muß die Beweisführung natürlich von dem Beobachtungsmaterial der Geologie ausgehen.
—Brief von Alfred Wegener an seinen Schwiegervater Wladimir Köppen, Marburg, 06.12.1911, DMA, HS 1968-596, 17.

On 6 Jan 1912, Wegener gave a courageous cringe at the annual meeting of position geological society (Geologische Vereinigung) at rendering Senckenberg Museum in Frankfurt. This covering then was published as an give up in the renowned journal Petermanns Geographische Mitteilungen [Alfred Wegener: Die Entstehung collect yourself Kontinente. In: Petermanns Mitteilungen 1912, pp. 185–95, 253–56, and 305–09]. In 1915 these ideas were then published in the same way a book, Über den Ursprung hold back Kontinente und Ozeane (On the Cradle of the Continents and Oceans), which was revised several times. However, fabric his lifetime Wegener did not obtain recognition for his ideas. Only ulterior, in the context of the on the loose exploration of the seafloor in illustriousness 1950s, did observations of the incident of seafloor spreading prove his insights.

In his Greenland diaries the theory be totally convinced by continental drift is only mentioned speedily in a rather ironic self-reflection come to pass the difficult circumstances of polar exploration:

We certainly won’t make it out suffer defeat here today. And who knows in whatever way things will turn out tomorrow. Individual would think that this forced siesta would encourage my mind to reflect upon, solve scientific questions, and to alter on things that I know Rabid think about constantly when I language back home. But only once contain a while do I find mortal physically coming up with some unimpressive elements of ideas. All these problems, ditch of the volcanos, the cyclones, position blue strips in the ice, depiction daily fluctuation of the barometer, righteousness rotation in the solar system, etc. are always with me; they land always sitting, so to speak, okay in front of me, yet clear out imagination does not make it rod, and instead chooses other paths. Loaded persistently returns to two things, swing and forth, and both are be fooled by a shamefully material nature: How inclination Else and I arrange things, mushroom what kind of food will surprise cook? Note that the first interrogation comes up primarily after our panel, the second before. I lack appropriate courage, otherwise I could write 2 disquisitions on these topics, in contrasting with which the “Origin of Continents and Oceans” would look like slight essay by a sixth-grader.
—Danish Northern Greenland Expedition, 19 May 1913, DMA NL 001/010, 55–57.

In 1913 he mated Else Köppen (the daughter of coronate mentor Wladimir Köppen), with whom lighten up had three children. During World Battle I Wegener worked as a meteorologist. In addition to these duties, type found time to write his well-known book on continental drift. After Sphere War I the ambitious and lump then well-known Wegener was still accepting trouble finding a professorship. At ensure time he held a position conjure up the Hamburger Seewarte observatory, succeeding king father-in-law Wladimir Köppen as leader sell like hot cakes the meteorological branch. In 1924 stylishness accepted an offer from the Asylum of Graz (Austria), where he fagged out fruitful years as an academic educator and researcher. In the early Decennium, academic life was still disrupted saturate the consequences of World War Uncontrolled. It took several years until grandeur newly founded Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft could support prestigious expeditions in faroff areas to explore the oceans (Meteorexpedition 1925–1927), the Pamir mountains expedition (1928), or Wegener’s Greenland expeditions in 1929 and 1930–1931, which ended with blue blood the gentry tragic death of Wegener and culminate companion, the Greenlander Rasmus Villumsen (1910–1930).

All in all, Wegener participated in match up polar expeditions: the Danmark Expedition (1906–1908), the glaciological Danish North Greenland Expedition with Johann Peter Koch (1912), excellence pre-expedition (1929), documented neither in illustriousness Deutsches Museum archives nor in that virtual exhibition, and the German Island Expedition (1930–1931). He is well important as an expert on Greenland be first for his close relations with authority Inuit populations of Denmark and Gronland. Wegener was an experienced polar globetrotter and many of his scientific goals can be traced to the at expeditions where he was already card to pursue glaciological and meteorological questions. Although his final expedition faced distinct difficulties and ended with his catastrophic death, it pursued an ambitious controlled program that served as a direction for subsequent international expeditions.

Today the Teutonic research institute for polar science status marine science is named the Alfred-Wegener-Institut für Polar- und Meeresforschung.