Alexander Von Humboldt, The Man Who Made Batteries From Animal Tissue
Wikimedia CommonsAlexander von Humboldt wrote more than 36 books and 25,000 letters in his 89 years of life.
Like many others on this list, Alexander von Humboldt was an eccentric man. According to Smithsonian Magazine, von Humboldt’s ultimate goal was to understand “everything about everything.”
He was an avid traveler who visited four continents, and he was nothing shy of prolific when it came to writing. He also claimed that he only slept four hours a night and referred to coffee as “concentrated sunbeams.”
Some of his notable scientific achievements include theorizing that the continents spread through plate tectonics, mapping the distribution of plants on three continents, charting the movements of air and water at different latitudes and altitudes to create climate bands, and locating the magnetic equator, among others.
Needless to say, he was quite the accomplished fellow.
As a study published in Trends in Neurosciences reveals, however, von Humboldt also subscribed to the ideas of galvanism. To put these ideas to the test, he created batteries out of nothing but animal tissue.
He experimented with a large variety of substances in an attempt to determine their ability to effectively serve as electrodes. He ultimately came to the conclusion that blood was far more effective at transmitting electricity than milk, wine, beer, or even plain water. He also discovered that nerves tend to work better if they are covered in a salt solution or muscle tissue, as opposed to dry air.
In all, von Humboldt tested the conductive prowess of up to 300 plant and animal species in his attempt to uncover life’s mysteries.
