History of NUI Galway, the Science Faculty and associated scientists.

Alexander Anderson (1858-1936)

Anderson was the first person to suggest the existence of black holes and the first to speculate about what would happen if a star collapsed under its own gravity.  He was a great man, whose ideas were ahead of his time.  Anderson was a teacher and researcher in Experimental and Mathematical Physics as well as being an able University Administrator.  He devoted much of his life to University College Galway. 

Originally from Coleraine, Anderson began his career at Queen’s College Galway in 1877.  He graduated in 1880 with a gold medal for his BA.  He then took first place in an open scholarship to Sydney Sussex College in the University of Cambridge where he studied Physics and Mathematics and came out as sixth wrangler in 1884.  He returned to Galway in 1885 and shortly after, succeeded Joseph Larmor as Professor of Natural Philosophy.  He was also president of Queen’s College Galway for thirty-five years.  Anderson’s interest in the practical applications of physics is illustrated by the fact that his department was providing a medical radiography service in Galway from 1898.  He was also involved in industrially sponsored research.  Around 1899 the Eastman-Kodak Company provided a fellowship for the study of X-ray photography.  Unfortunately the tissue of a child was damaged and scarred by an X-ray exposure.  This activity attracted worldwide attention, as it was the cause of probably the first instance of litigation on the injurious effects of ionising radiation though thankfully the verdict was in favour of the College. 

His research covered a wide range of topics from the focometry of lenses to theoretical studies in electrostatics and magnetism.  He made some great contributions to practical physics, such as his bridge method of measuring the self-inductance of a circuit (Anderson’s method), his constant volume method of measuring the viscosity of a gas and the pendant drop method of determining the surface tension of a liquid. 

Alexander Anderson was the first person to suggest the existence of black holes.  Earlier astronomers had speculated about the existence of massive, dark and invisible stars.  These ideas however fell out of favour in the 1800s as scientists came to believe that gravity would not affect a light beam.  However in 1919 a total solar eclipse confirmed Einstein’s general Theory of Relativity and proved that gravity could indeed bend a beam of light.  Anderson speculated that the sun’s gravitational field might affect a ray of light.  Anderson was the first to speculate about what would happen if a star collapsed under its own gravity and to postulate the existence of what physicists now call a black hole.  At that time Anderson’s theory was overlooked. 

During his career in Galway, Anderson ensured that the Physics department had state of the art equipment including the then newly invented X-ray and radio apparatus and cathode ray tubes.  It is said of Anderson that his primary interest lay in teaching and that he was rarely content to give a piece of theory from a textbook without first improving or simplifying it. 

Sources:

Tom O’Connor: Natural Philosophy/Physics, From Queen’s College to National University, Tadhg Foley (ed), Four Courts Press, Dublin 1999.

Mary Mulvihill, Ingenious Ireland: A county-by-county exploration of Irish mysteries and marvels, Townhouse Publishers, Dublin 2002.

Irish Innovators in Science and Technology.  Published jointly by the Royal Irish Academy and Enterprise Ireland, an updated and enlarged version of the two-volume People and Places in Irish Science & Technology published in 1985 and 1990. Charles Mollan, William Davis and Brendan Finucane (eds), Royal Irish Academy and Enterprise Ireland, Dublin 2002.

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