History
In 1780, Luigi Galvani discovered that when two different metals (e.g., copper and zinc) are connected and then both touched at the same time to two different parts of a nerve of a frog leg, then the leg contracts. He called this "animal electricity". The voltaic pile, invented by Alessandro Volta in the 1800s, is similar to the galvanic cell.
These discoveries paved the way for electrical batteries; Volta's cell was named an IEEE Milestone in 1999.
Read more about this topic: Galvanic Cell
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“The only history is a mere question of one’s struggle inside oneself. But that is the joy of it. One need neither discover Americas nor conquer nations, and yet one has as great a work as Columbus or Alexander, to do.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“Look through the whole history of countries professing the Romish religion, and you will uniformly find the leaven of this besetting and accursed principle of action—that the end will sanction any means.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)
“There is a history in all men’s lives,
Figuring the natures of the times deceased,
The which observed, a man may prophesy,
With a near aim, of the main chance of things
As yet not come to life.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)