PLÜCKER, (JULIUS). - THE DISCOVERY OF CATHODE RAYS.

Ueber die Constitution der elektrischen Spectra der verschiedenen Gase und Dämpfe. (+) Nachtrag zu der Abhandlung über die Consstitution der elektrischen Spectra der verschiedenen Gase und Dämpfe. (2 papers).

Leipzig, Johann Ambrosius Barth, 1859. Without wrappers as issued in "Annalen der Physik und Chemie. Hrsg.von Poggendorff", Bd. 107, Viertes Stück.(= Heft No. 8 of 1859). (The entire issue offered (Heft 4 of vol. 107 with titlepage to vol. 107). Pp. 497-660. - Plücker's papers: pp. 497-539 a. 638-643. Clean and fine.

First printing of this milestone paper describing Plückers first observations on Cathode Rays, which he called "the beautiful and mysterious green glow", and produced by discharges in tubes exhausted by means of the Geissler pump. These importent observations lead directly to Röntgens discovery of the Röntgen Rays.

"Cathode rays were first observed by Julius Plücker in 1859 (the paper offered). They are rays which are found in the neighbourhood of the point of exit of an electrical current passing through a Geissler tube. These rays stimulated intense interest and experiment. William Crookes greatly improved these discharge tubes and intensified the degree of rarification of gases within them. The tubes in this form is known as Crookes tube. Crookes declared his conciction that the cathode rays represented matter in a fourth, hitherto unobserved form....It was reserved for J.J. Thomson (in 1908) to discover the true nature of the cathode rays."(PMM no 386).

Order-nr.: 43325