Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit
Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit (24 May 1686- 16 September 1736)
When watching NOVA: Absolute Zero I found the story of Gabriel Fahrenheit particularly interesting. He is noted for making thermometers with mercury and marking them with particularly useful temperatures such as the cool mixture of ice, water, and ammonium chloride (0 °F), the freezing of water (32 °F), and the average temperature of the human body (96°F) thus making the Fahrenheit scale. Another feature of Fahrenheit's thermometers is that they were a much more practical size and much more accurate all this was because he used mercury rather than alcohol. These accomplishments dub him the originator of the era of precision thermometry.
Biography
Fahrenheit was born in 1686 in the city of Danzig (Gdańsk), Pomeranian Voivodeship in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. He lived most of his life however in the Dutch Republic. Fahrenheit's interest in natural sciences led him to begin studies and experiments in the field. He then moved back to his hometown where he became a glass blower making barometers, altimeters, and thermometers. In the later years of his life Fahrenheit lectured in chemistry and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.