John Zeleny (March 26, 1872 – June 19, 1951) was an American physicist who, in 1911, invented the Zeleny electroscope. He also studied the effect of an electric field on a liquid meniscus. His work is seen by some as a beginning to emergent technologies like liquid metal ion sources and electrospraying and electrospinning.[3][4]
John Zeleny | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | March 26, 1872[1] |
| Died | June 19, 1951 (aged 79)[2] New Haven, Connecticut |
| Nationality | American |
| Alma mater | University of Minnesota (B.S. 1892, Ph.D. 1906) University of Cambridge (B.A. 1899) Yale University (M.A. (honorary), 1915) |
| Known for | Zeleny electroscope electrospray ion mobility |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Physicist |
| Institutions | University of Minnesota Yale University |
| Doctoral advisor | Henry T. Eddy |
| Other academic advisors | J. J. Thomson |
Zeleny was born in Racine, Wisconsin to a Czech immigrant couple from Křídla.[5][6] He was the older brother of Charles Zeleny. He attended the University of Minnesota (B.S., 1892), followed by Trinity College, Cambridge (B.A., 1899), and the University of Minnesota (PhD, 1906).[1] Zeleny began his teaching career at the University of Minnesota after earning his B.A. in 1892. Zeleny was an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.[7] He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1915.[8] That same year, he joined the faculty at Yale, where he was chairman of the physics department and director of graduate studies in physics until his retirement in 1940.[9]